THE  LIBRARY 
OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION 


IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION 


"  I  have  gathered  a  posie  of  other  men's  flowers,  and  nothing 
but  the  thread  that  binds  them  is  mine  own." 

MONTAIGNE 


SIXTH    EDITION 


CHICAGO 

A.  C.  McCLURG  AND  COMPANY 
1898 


COPYRIGHT 

BY  A.   C.   McCLURG  AND  C<X 

A.D.  1894 


TO 


WHO   HAS    FIXED    MY    IDKALS,    EMBODIED    MY    DREAMS, 

AND    DEEPENED   MY   SENSE   OF   THE    POSSIBLE 

BEAUTY   OF   EXISTENCE. 

January,  1894. 


1703882 


AN   EXPLANATION. 


T  HAVE  wandered  among  many  ages 
•*-  and  climes  of  literature,  and  have 
picked  up  various  bits  of  knowledge  and 
beauties  of  sentiment.  When,  "  In  Maiden 
Meditation,"  I  began  to  record  the  flying 
thoughts  that  have  come  in  the  midst  of 
dinings  and  dances,  I  was  often  puzzled  to 
know  the  children  of  my  own  brain  from 
those  of  my  adopted  fancy.  However,  Mr. 
Emerson  ranks  the  quoter  of  a  good  thing 
next  to  its  originator,  and  I  acknowledge 
that  I  have  been  a  very  Sabine,  both  con 
sciously  and  unconsciously,  in  appropriat 
ing  other  people's  goods.  After  all,  who 
among  us  is  wholly  original  ?  Not  Homer, 
singing  the  myths  and  traditions  of  olden 
Greece,  nor  yet  inspired  Shakespeare,  em 
bodying  into  classic  and  enduring  form  the 
legends  of  all  lands  and  ages.  Our  mod- 


8  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ern  philosophers  but  interpret  the  wisdom 
of  Plato,  and  each  succeeding  generation 
of  wise  men  but  gives  the  same  answers  to 
the  same  old  questions  that  still  defy  solu 
tion.  And  there  is  no  new  thing  under 
the  sun.  I  have  omitted  the  "  pestiferous 
quotation-mark,"  assuming  that  my  readers 
have  wandered  as  widely  as  I  have.  They 
will  recognize,  I  am  sure,  without  fur 
ther  indication,  the  rare  gems,  which,  as  old 
friends,  flash  back  smiles  of  recognition, 
and  they  will,  I  hope,  appreciate  and  enjoy 
the  new  ones  found  on  every  page,  deem 
ing  them  worthy,  if  only  in  a  small  degree, 
of  the  good  company  in  which  they  are 
found.  It  is,  after  all,  only  a  simple  record 
of  a  woman's  moods,  caprices,  tendernesses, 
dreams.  May  the  mosaic  be  judged  har 
monious,  whether  the  fragments  be  seized 
from  Diogenes  or  Dr.  Holmes,  from  Balzac, 
George  Eliot,  or  Julien  Gordon,  or  whether 
they  are  only  the  dreams  and  theories  of 

E.  V.  A. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

AFTER  THE  BALL J3 

AFTER  DINNER •    •    •  55 

AFTER  CHURCH 97 

AFTER  A  WEDDING 127 

AFTER  ONE  SUMMER 167 


AFTER  THE  BALL. 


IN  MAIDEN   MEDITATION." 


AFTER  THE  BALL. 

"  I  heard  as  I  hurriedly  entered  the  door 
The  church  clock  strike  twelve  : 
The  last  waltz  was  just  o'er." 

WITH  soul  attuned  to  the  exquisite 
melody  of  that  last  waltz,  I  am 
alone  with  my  thoughts.  The  frolicsome 
rhythm  of  the  scherzo  seems  to  tell  of  the 
gayety  and  frivolity  of  the  hours  past ;  the 
soft  andante  engenders  sentiment  and  peace 
which,  as  the  sounding  brass  becomes  louder 
and  more  rapid,  is  merged  into  the  vanity, 
emulation,  and  contention  of  the  ball-room. 
Music  was  before  speech,  and  is  now  beyond 
speech; (for  language  is  not  subtle  enough 
to  express  the  deepest,  highest,  tenderest 
longings  of  the  human  heart.]  Music  is 
a  language  conveying  the  most  vivid  im 
pressions,  embodying  the  whole  range  of 


14  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

emotions,  from  the  delicate,  ethereal  tender 
ness  of  a  dream  of  love,  to  the  despairing 
wail  of  a  nation  borne  down  by  the  anguish 
of  ultimate  defeat. 

Perhaps  a  funeral  march  —  the  heavy, 
alternating  chords  in  the  bass  sounding  like 
the  rhythmic  tread  of  armed  men,  the  sob 
bing  chords  of  a  minor  harmony  freighted 
with  the  tragedy,  the  heart-break,  of  a  thou 
sand  defeats  —  weigh  one  down  as  with  the 
agony  of  a  personal  grief,  when  out  of  the 
tumult  and  anguish  of  the  chant  a  heavenly 
melody  soars  like  the  prayer  of  faith.  The 
soft  murmur  of  a  nocturne,  the  faint  cares 
sing  diminuendo  of  the  lullaby,  the  wailing 
harmony  of  the  dirge,  the  melodious  bene 
diction  that  is  like  the  "  Peace  be  with 
you"  of  an  angel,  the  tumultuous  cres 
cendo  of  emotion,  like  a  majestic  epic, 
becomes  an  awakening  and  a  revelation. 
Only  music  can  bridge  the  vast  distance, 
and  interpret  to  Heaven  the  prayers  of 
men  in  all  the  omnipotence  of  their  de 
sires,  in  all  the  diversities  of  their  woe, 
with  the  tints  of  their  meditations  and 


AFTER    THE  BALL.  15 

their  ecstasies,  with  the  impetuous  spring 
of  their  repentance,  and  the  thousand  im 
aginations  of  their  manifold  beliefs. 

My  ball- dress  is  thrown  over  the  chair. 
Its  freshness  and  purity  are  gone ;  and  as 
I  gaze  sorrowfully  at  its  tattered  condition, 
I  sigh,  not  for  "  the  fleeting  show  for  man's 
illusion  given,"  but  for  an  undiscovered 
bourne,  where  woman's  illusions  and  other 
trappings  will  be  allowed  to  rest  in  peace. 
What  a  pretty,  dainty  gown  it  was,  and  how 
much  the  knowledge  that  it  was  becoming 
added  to  my  pleasure  !  VThe  consciousness 
of  being  well  dressed,  it  is  said,  imparts  a 
blissfulness  to  the  human  heart  that  even 
religion  is  powerless  to  give  or  take  away, 
and  its  importance  can  hardly  be  over-esti 
mated  by  the  feminine  mind.  \  The  value 
of  clothes  was  impressed  upon  the  heathen, 
and  they  declared  the  art  of  weaving  to  be 
of  divine  origin ;  for,  according  to  Grecian 
mythology,  a  goddess  was  sent  from  Mount 
Olympus  to  teach  this  art  to  the  Greek 
maids.  The  Hebrew  mother,  with  constant 
toil,  accomplished  the  covering  for  her 


1 6  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

household.  "She  layeth  her  hand  to  the 
spindle,  and  her  hands  hold  the  distaff." 
The  savage  who  adorns  himself  with  strings 
of  shells  or  with  feathers  has  taken  the 
first  step  towards  civilization ;  and  the  tat 
tooed  is  somewhat  in  advance  of  the  un- 
frescoed. 

Clothes  have  become  among  all  nations 
an  index  of  character.  For  woman  in 
dressmaking,  as  man  in  legislating,  does 
not  proceed  by  mere  accident,  but  the 
hand  is  ever  guided  by  the  mysterious 
operations  of  the  mind.  What  meaning 
lies,  not  only  in  texture  and  design  of  our 
garments,  but  in  color.  From  the  sober 
drab  to  the  high-flaming  scarlet,  mental 
idiosyncrasies  unfold  themselves  in  choice 
of  color.  Carlyle,  after  astute  reasoning, 
arrives  at  the  conclusion  that  "Cut  be 
tokens  intellect  and  talent  j  color  reveals 
temper  and  heart." 

.  Authors  realize  how  much  depends  upon 
the  clothes  that  are  worn  by  characters  in 
novels,  —  clothes  put  on,  not  only  to  please 
the  readers  who  are  to  associate  with  them, 


AFTER    THE  BALL.  17 

but  to  exhibit  the  inner  life  of  the  char 
acters.  It  is  pretty  well  understood  that 
women,  and  even  men,  are  made  to  exhibit 
the  deepest  passions  and  the  tenderest 
emotions  by  the  clothes  they  put  on. 
How  a  woman  in  a  crisis  hesitates  before 
her  wardrobe,  and  at  last  chooses  just  what 
will  express  her  innermost  feelings !  At 
times,  I  think  his  Satanic  Majesty  himself 
sends  a  special  messenger  to  preside  over 
a  woman's  toilet,  to  peep  and  hide  and 
beckon  in  the  plait  of  a  dress,  in  the 
curve  of  a  girdle,  on  the  tip  of  a  shoe, 
in  a  coil  of  hair. 

Does  she  dress  for  her  lover  as  she 
dresses  to  receive  her  lawyer,  who  has 
come  to  inform  her  that  she  is  living  be 
yond  her  income?  Would  not  the  lover 
be  spared  time  and  pain  if  he  knew,  as  the 
novelist  does,  whether  the  young  lady  is 
dressing  for  a  rejection  or  an  acceptance? 

A  clever  man  has  acknowledged  recently 
that  clothes  alter  his  very  nature ;  that  he 
could  not  help  being  fierce  or  daring  with 
a  plume  in  his  bonnet,  a  dagger  in  his 


1 8  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

belt,  and  a  lot  of  puffy  white  things  down 
his  sleeves.  But  in  an  ulster  he  wants  to 
get  behind  a  lamp-post  and  call  the  police. 
A  woman,  I  know,  never  appears  to  better 
advantage  in  any  way  —  her  talk  is  never 
so  brilliant,  her  heart  is  never  so  loving 
and  charitable,  as  when  she  is  conscious  of 
looking  her  best.  A  brilliant  Frenchman 
declares  he  has  theories  concerning  the 
veriest  trifles,  —  gloves,  boots,  buckles,  —  to 
which  he  attaches  the  greatest  importance, 
having  discovered  that  a  certain  relation 
exists  between  the  character  of  women 
and  the  caprice  of  costume.  Each  woman 
should  know  that  the  very  folds  of  her  dra 
pery,  each  frill  of  lace,  are  but  expressions 
of  the  inner  self,  betraying  its  boundless 
grace  or  its  poverty  of  outline  and  expres 
sion.  Is  it  not,  then,  the  part  of  wisdom 
in  women  to  stand  for  hours  before  the 
mirror  in  adorning  this  "  perishable  body," 
to  twist  carefully  the  silken  tresses,  to  guard 
tenderly  the  single  cuticle  that  divides  youth 
and  gayety  from  wrinkled  old  age  and  lone 
liness,  to  puzzle  and  weary  their  minds  in 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  19 

youth  by  mathematical  problems,  lest  they 
should  fail  to  properly  calculate  the  angle 
at  which  to  wear  their  bonnets  or  the  sym 
metrical  ratio  of  a  tie-back?  Is  it  not  time 
well  spent,  since  the  most  trifling  details 
of  dress,  the  grain  of  cloth,  the  shade  of 
a  ribbon,  may  be  uncomfortable  revelations 
of  character  to  appreciative  eyes?  Most 
women,  I  fancy,  appreciate  the  importance 
of  dress.  Did  you  ever  see  a  group  of 
half-dozen  women,  arch,  brilliant,  mutinous, 
discussing  some  subject  in  secret  conclave 
with  such  avidity  that  you  long  to  know 
what  it  is,  believing  the  topic  to  be  some 
thing  racy,  wicked,  delicious?  When  you 
draw  near  you  discover  that  they  are 
eagerly  discussing  whether  petticoats  are 
to  be  scant  or  full  next  season,  flat  at  the 
hips  or  bouffant,  drapery  long  or  short. 

It  is  exquisitely  absurd  to  tell  a  girl  that 
beauty  is  of  no  value,  dress  of  no  use. 
Her  whole  prospect  and  happiness  in  life 
may  depend  upon  a  new  gown  or  a  becom 
ing  bonnet ;  and  if  she  has  five  grains  of 
common-sense  she  will  find  out  that  love 


, 


20  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

itself  will  hardly  survive  a  winter  hat  worn 
after  Easter. 

Men  may  pretend  to  like  intellectual 
women,  but  they  can  pardon  anything 
better  than  an  ill-fitting  gown.  Better  a 
thousand  times  (I  say  it  after  the  most 
profound  consideration)  be  frivolous  than 
badly  dressed.  Moralists  may  continue  to 
impress  upon  the  world  that  beauty  is  a 
delusion,  faces  are  masks  (it  is  always,  by 
the  way,  a  feminine  eye  that  detects  the 
moral  deficiencies  hidden  under  the  "  dear 
deceit "  of  beauty)  ;  but  it  remains  an  axiom 
of  life  that  a  charming  face  can  make  a 
man  campaign  and  fight  and  slay  like  a 
demon,  can  make  a  coward  of  him,  can  fill 
him  with  ambition  to  win  the  world,  and 
can  tame  him  into  the  domesticity  of  a 
dining-room  cat. 

It  is  true  that  behind  those  dark,  soul- 
stirring  eyes  may  be  a  heart  devoid  of  one 
impulse  of  tenderness ;  that  the  clear  gray 
eye,  no  traitor  to  the  heart,  may  reveal 
no  insincerity,  no  want  of  frankness;  but 
if  in  the  reaction  of  disgust  you  betake 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  21 

yourself  to  a  fishy  eye,  there  is  surprising 
similarity  of  result.  One  begins  to  suspect, 
after  a  while,  that  there  is  no  direct  corre 
lation  between  eyes  and  morals. 

Nature  has  a  language,  and  is  not  un- 
veracious ;  but  we  don't  know  all  the 
intricacies  of  her  syntax  just  yet,  and  in  a 
hasty  reading  we  may  happen  to  extract 
the  very  opposite  of  her  real  meaning. 

The  love  of  beauty  is  shared  by  man 
with  most  animals.  The  wings  of  the  moth 
are  painted  by  love,  by  desire ;  and  this  is 
the  foundation  of  the  bird's  song.  For  my 
own  part,  I  have  no  less  respect  and  deep 
sympathy  for  a  man  who  has  fallen  under 
the  witchery  of  a  lovely  face.  Is  it  any 
weakness,  pray,  to  be  wrought  on  by  ex 
quisite  music,  to  feel  its  wondrous  har 
monies  searching  the  subtlest  windings  of 
your  soul,  the  delicate  fibres  of  life,  where 
no  memory  can  penetrate,  and  binding 
together  your  whole  being  past  and  pres 
ent  into  one  unspeakable  vibration,  melting 
you  in  one  moment  with  all  the  tenderness, 
all  the  love,  that  has  been  scattered 


22  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION, 

through  the  toilsome  years,  concentrating 
in  one  emotion  of  heroic  courage  or  resigna 
tion  all  the  hard-earned  lessons  of  self-re 
nouncing  sympathy,  blending  your  present 
joy  with  past  sorrow,  your  present  sorrow 
with  all  your  past  joy?  If  not,  then  neither 
is  it  a  weakness  to  be  so  wrought  upon  by 
the  exquisite  curves  of  a  woman's  cheek 
and  neck  and  arms,  by  the  liquid  depths  of 
her  beseeching  eyes,  or  the  sweet  childish 
pout  of  her  lips.  For  the  beauty  of  a  lovely 
woman  is  like  music;  what  can  one  say 
more? 

Beauty  has  an  expression  beyond  and 
far  above  the  one  woman's  soul  that  it 
clothes,  as  the  words  of  genius  have  a  wider 
meaning  than  the  thought  that  prompted 
them.  It  is  more  than  a  woman's  love  that 
moves  us  in  a  woman's  eyes.  It  seems  to 
be  a  far-off  mighty  love  that  has  come  near 
to  us,  and  made  speech  for  itself  there  : 
the  rounded  cheek,  the  dimpled  arm,  move 
us  by  something  more  than  their  prettiness, 
—  by  their  close  kinship  with  all  we  have 
known  of  tenderness  and  peace. 


AFTER    THE  BALL.  23 

A  woman's  arm  touched  the  soul  of  a 
great  sculptor  two  thousand  years  ago,  so 
that  he  wrought  an  image  of  it  for  the  Par 
thenon,  which  moves  us  still,  as  it  clasps 
lovingly  the  time-worn  marble  of  a  headless 
trunk. 

The  noblest  nature  sees  the  most  of  this 
impersonal  expression  in  beauty  (it  is  need 
less  to  say  there  are  gentlemen  with  whis 
kers  dyed  and  undyed  who  see  nothing  of 
it  whatever)  ;  and  for  this  reason  the  no 
blest  nature  is  often  blinded  to  the  character 
of  the  one  woman's  soul  that  the  beauty 
clothes.  Whence  the  tragedy  of  human  life 
is  likely  to  continue  for  a  long  time  to  come, 
in  spite  of  mental  philosophers  who  are  ready 
with  the  best  recipes  for  avoiding  mistakes 
of  this  kind. 

All  honor  and  reverence  to  the  divine 
beauty  of  form  !  Let  us  cultivate  it  to  the 
utmost  in  men,  women,  and  children,  in 
our  gardens  and  in  our  houses ;  but  let  us 
love  that  other  beauty,  too,  which  lies  in  no 
secret  of  proportion,  but  in  the  secret  of  t- 
deep  human  sympathy.  Paint  us  an  angel, 


24  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

if  you  can,  with  floating  violet  robes,  and  a 
face  paled  by  celestial  light ;  paint  us  yet 
oftener  a  Madonna,  turning  her  mild  face 
upward,  and  opening  her  arms  to  welcome 
the  divine  glory.  But  do  not  impose  upon 
us  aesthetic  rules  which  shall  banish  from 
the  region  of  art  those  old  women  with 
work-worn  hands,  men  with  rounded  backs 
and  stupid,  weather-beaten  faces,  that  have 
bent  over  spades  and  done  the  rough  work 
of  the  world. 

In  this  world  there  are  so  many  common, 
coarse  people  who  have  no  picturesque,  sen 
timental  wretchedness.  It  is  needful  we 
remember  their  existence,  or  else  we  may 
happen  to  leave  them  quite  out  of  our 
religion  and  philosophy,  form  lofty  theories 
which  fit  only  a  world  of  extremes,  and  fail 
to  sympathize  with  those  men  who  have 
given  the  loving  pains  of  a  life  to  the  faith 
ful  representing  of  commonplace  things,  — 
men  who  have  seen  beauty  in  these  com 
monplace  things,  and  delight  in  showing 
how  kindly  the  light  of  heaven  falls  on 
them. 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  25 

There  are  few  prophets,  few  heroes,  and 
few  divinely  beautiful  women  in  the  world. 
But  beauty  is  not  everything,  and  things 
may  be  lovable  that  are  not  altogether 
handsome.  I  think  it  is  quite  true  that 
the  majority  of  the  human  race  have  been 
ugly. 

I  have  a  friend  or  two  whose  class  of 
features  is  such  that  the  Apollo  curl  on  the 
summit  of  their  brows  would  be  decidedly 
trying;  yet,  to  my  certain  knowledge,  ten 
der  hearts  have  beaten  for  them,  and  their 
miniatures,  flattering  but  still  not  lovely,  are 
kissed  in  secret  by  loving  lips.  I  have 
seen  many  an  excellent  matron  who  could 
never  in  her  best  days  have  been  hand 
some,  and  yet  she  has  a  package  of  love- 
letters  in  a  private  drawer,  and  sweet  chil 
dren  shower  kisses  on  her  sallow  cheeks. 
And  I  believe  there  have  been  plenty  of 
young  heroes  of  middle  stature  and  feeble 
beard,  who  have  felt  quite  sure  they  could 
never  love  anything  less  magnificent  than  a 
Diana,  yet  have  found  themselves  happily 
settled  in  middle  life  with  a  wife  who 


26  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

waddles.  Yes,  thank  God,  human  feeling 
is  like  the  mighty  rivers  that  bless  the 
earth :  it  does  not  wait  for  beauty ;  it 
flows  with  resistless  force  and  brings  beauty 
with  it. 

"  Idle  Thoughts  of  Idle  Fellows  "  and 
"  Reveries  of  Bachelors  "  have,  from  time 
to  time,  been  submitted  to  our  criticism. 
These  lords  of  creation,  lolling  in  easy- 
chairs,  with  lighted  cigars,  evolve,  through 
clouds  of  smoke,  theories  concerning  love, 
which  is  easy  enough  lighted,  but  needs  con 
stancy  to  keep  it  in  a  glow ;  or  of  matri 
mony,  which  has  a  great  deal  of  fire  in  the 
beginning,  but  it  is  a  fire  that  consumes  all 
that  feeds  the  blaze  ;  or  about  life,  which  at 
first  is  fresh  and  odorous,  but  ends  shortly 
in  a  charred  cinder,  which  is  fit  only  for 
the  ground.  They  carefully  consider,  in 
their  moments  of  solitude,  whether  it  is 
best  to  dream  on  of  a  future  Elysium,  where 
only  roses  bloom,  or  reduce  their  visions 
to  the  dull  standard  of  reality.  And  why 
not  doubt,  why  not  tremble,  Bachelor  or 


AFTER   THE  BALL,  27 

Maiden,  at  so  radical  a  change  in  your 
manner  of  living,  so  complete  an  inter 
ruption  to  all  the  habits  of  your  life  ?  Can 
a  man  stake  his  bachelor  respectability,  his 
independence  and  comfort,  upon  the  die 
of  absorbing,  unchanging,  relentless  matri 
mony,  without  trembling  at  the  venture? 
Can  a  woman  find  one  who  will  realize  the 
ideal  of  the  "  unknown  god,"  which  reigns 
in  the  heart  of  every  woman,  and  to  whom, 
like  the  Greeks  of  old,  she  constantly  min 
isters  and  sacrifices? 

"  Why  not,"  a  bachelor  queries,  "  go  on 
dreaming?"  Can  any  wife  be  prettier 
than  an  after-dinner  fancy,  idle  and  yet 
vivid,  can  paint  for  you?  Can  any  house 
wife  be  more  unexceptionable  than  she  who 
goes  sweeping  daintily  the  cobwebs  that 
gather  in  your  dreams?  If  she  becomes 
tiresome  or  provoking,  he  has  only  to  open 
his  eyes  —  she  is  gone,  and  the  old  free 
life  continues. 

Thoughts  of  this  nature  come  with  even 
more  force  to  the  minds  of  maidens,  as 
they  sit  in  their  dainty  boudoirs,  building 


28  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

castles  in  the  air.  For  they  realize  that  the 
trifling  incidents  of  the  day,  the  sympathy 
and  approval  of  one  man,  make  up  their 
whole  existence,  and  without  them  their 
lives  are  wrecked.  There  is  no  outside 
world  to  which  they  can  flee  for  comfort ; 
no  professional  or  business  occupations  with 
which  to  engross  their  minds;  no  club- 
rooms  where  they  can  be  amused. 

Then,  if  a  man  feels  no  inclination  to 
marry,  he  has  only  to  remain  passive  and 
think  nothing  about  it,  while  a  woman  has 
to  listen  to  the  arguments  and  entreaties  of 
impassioned  lovers,  who  picture  connubial 
bliss  in  its  most  attractive  guises,  until  she 
is  won,  often  regardless  of  judgment  and 
reason,  yielding  to  the  pride  of  being  loved, 
which,  Bulwer  says,  most  women  mistake 
for  love. 

Call  this  weakness,  if  you  will,  Mr.  Bach 
elor,  but  picture  yourself  besieged  by  a 
lovely  woman  whose  beauty  and  grace  have 
already  won  from  you  the  tribute  of  admira 
tion  ;  to  have  her  sweet  voice  tell  you  that 
you  had  become  to  her  the  embodiment 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  29 

of  all  that  was  true  and  noble  in  man,  that 
life  without  you  would  form  a  dreary  waste  : 
the  sweet  voice  would  falter,  and  the  lovely 
eyes,  suffused  with  tears,  would  by  turns 
betray  her  love,  her  anxiety,  her  hope.  If 
by  reason  of  the  "woody"  fibre  of  your 
nature,  you  were  enabled  to  say  nay  to 
her  sweet  pleading,  would  your  manly 
strength  resist  a  siege  of  this  delicious 
flattery? 

Are  there  many  men  who  can  resist  the 
charm  of  the  one  woman  who  believes  them 
to  be  heroic  ?  And  are  not  most  men  really 
better  for  the  trust  and  faith  that  is  placed 
in  them  by  others?  —  as  the  earthen  vessel, 
valueless  in  itself,  becomes  a  thing  of  price 
and  beauty  under  the  loving  hands  of  the 
artist,  who  draws  graceful  figures  upon  it, 
colors  it  skilfully,  and  handles  it  tenderly. 

A  wise  philosopher  recently  discoursed 
upon  the  subject  of  a  woman's  proposing. 
He  argued  in  this  wise.  It  is  generally 
conceded  that  women  have  a  clear  con 
ception  of  what  they  want ;  and  why  should 
they  be  more  handicapped  than  men  in 


30  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

obtaining  it?  Would  they  make  more  mis 
takes  than  men?  It  is  impossible.  All 
history  teaches  us  that  women  have  been 
accustomed  to  scheme  for  what  they  want, 
and  alas  !  as  much  after  marriage  as  before. 
It  is  no  answer  to  the  question,  whether 
women  will  propose,  to  say  that  every 
woman  can  get  married  who  wishes  to,  do 
so,  and  that  all  history  shows  this.  The  real 
question  is,  is  she  free  to  marry  according 
to  her  taste  and  inclination,  and  would  she 
be  happier  in  the  majority  of  cases  if  she 
could  honorably  approach  those  to  whom 
she  is  attracted,  instead  of  waiting  to  be 
approached  by  those  who  are  attracted  to 
her?  To  this  effect  reasons  a  man,  and  so 
might  I  in  some  prosaic  moment ;  but  the 
sound  of  one  man's  voice  would  put  to  flight 
such  a  theory  in  the  minds  of  most  women. 
For  the  sweetest  music  in  the  world  to  a 
woman's  ears  is  the  voice  of  a  man  telling 
her  that  he  loves  her,  and  it  is  music  of  so 
potent  a  character  that  it  often  melts  a 
heart  that  was  cold  before.  As  for  me,  I 
cherish  enough  old-fashioned  sentiment  in 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  31 

my  heart  to  believe  that  the  pleasure  of 
being  wooed  far  transcends  the  pleasure  of 
wooing. 

Maidens  will  continue  to  dream  of  that 
one  who  in  time  will  whisper  that  all- 
important  question.  What  different  forms 
those  ideals  take  in  their  visions  !  We  have 
but  to  glance  at  here  a  page  and  there  a 
page  of  the  past  records  of  the  race  to  feel 
quite  sure  that  woman's  ideal  man  has 
varied  much  in  the  tide  of  time.  In  the 
days  of  Homer,  daughters  yearned  to  be 
led  from  the  parental  roof  by  some  Achilles 
of  a  youth,  broad-chested,  with  a  soul  of 
adamant  and  an  eye  of  consuming  fire.  At 
one  period,  the  influence  of  Byron's  power 
ful  genius  was  plainly  discernible  upon  the 
heroes  of  fiction  of  female  authors.  Again, 
a  bloodless  countenance  was  about  all  that 
was  required  to  constitute  a  hero  over  whom 
the  women  went  mad.  He  was  depicted 
as  cold  and  impassive  apparently ;  but  the 
author  would  contrive  to  suggest  by  a  deli 
cate  hint  here  and  there  that  this  coldness 
was  in  outward  seeming  only;  that  this 


32  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

stern,  haughty  possessor  of  the  broad,  pallid 
brow  (against  which  he  ever  and  anon 
pressed  his  hand  as  though  in  pain)  was 
the  clandestine  owner  of  feelings  fit  to  be 
compared  to  a  stream  of  lava.  In  this 
nineteenth  century,  we  find  the  ideal  to  be 
a  man  who  parts  his  hair  and  his  name  in 
the  middle,  employs  a  London  tailor,  and 
can  dance  the  German.  My  ideal,  I  think, 
varies  with  my  mood.  I  like  so  many  men 
for  one  particular  quality,  and  so  few  men 
for  all.  \  I  have  sometimes  fancied  that  I 
would  like  to  boil  down  the  characteristics 
of  some  ten  or  more  men  I  know,  take  off 
the  scum,  and  let  the  rest  crystallize  into  a 
being  who  would  respond  to  all  my  moods. 
He  might  become  a  Frankenstein  monster 
on  my  hands,  but  even  the  risk  would  be 
alluring. 

One  man  I  like,  because  he  brings  me 
candy  at  the  precise  moment  when  my 
inner  nature  craves  that  form  of  sustenance  ; 
another,  because  the  fragrance  of  his  flowers 
conveys  to  me  a  delicacy  and  refinement  of 
feeling  that  his  words  could  never  express. 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  33 

1  One  wholly  disapproves  of  me,  and  frankly 
exposes  my  faults  and  shortcomings  in  a 
way  that  affects  me  as  a.  bracing  tonic.  \  And 
there  is  yet  another  who  finds  me  perfect, 
and  so  skilfully  does  he  word  his  creed  of 
my  perfection,  that  it  penetrates  my  heart 
with  sweet  conviction,  while  my  spirit  in 
abject  gratitude  confesses  his  wonderful 
discrimination  and  judgment.  One  whom 
I  know  may  be  devoid  of  brains,  but  he 
dances  divinely,  and  in  certain  moods  he 
stands  the  favored  one. 

And  I  am  all  things  to  all  men.  To  one, 
I  am  gay  and  frivolous,  with  no  idea  above 
the  last  morsel  of  society  gossip,  no  hope 
of  heaven  but  in  looking  sweet.  To  the 
next,  I  am  an  earnest,  thoughtful  woman. 
With  this  one,  I  display  a  lack  of  sense  that 
is  close  akin  to  idiocy.  Another  suggestive, 
sympathetic  listener  calls  forth  treasures 
from  my  mind  that  I  am  ignorant  of  pos 
sessing.  To  one,  I  am  cold  and  austere ; 
to  another,  impulsive  and  loving.  To  only 
one,  perhaps,  of  all  my  friends,  do  I  open 
my  heart,  and  show  all  the  weakness,  all  the 
3 


34  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

pain,  all  the  vain  hopes  and  dreams.  In  no 
mood  am  I  affected ;  and  the  sad  thought 
in  moments  of  folly  is,  that  a  mood  lies  in 
one's  nature,  just  as  reflections  do,  and 
more;  and  one  can  never  do  anything  at 
variance  with  her  own  nature.  We  carry^ 
within  us  the  germs  of  our  most  exceptional 
actions. 

The  froth  and  frivolity,  the  glare  and  tri 
umphs  of  the  evening  are  cast  aside,  and  it 
seems  that  I  have  detached  myself  from 
the  madding  crowd,  and  from  some  high, 
secluded  spot  am  watching,  with  pitying 
eyes,  the  throng  hurrying  and  pressing  on  : 
some  with  great  gaunt  eyes  and  hollow 
cheeks,  fiercely  determined  to  win  the  race 
or  die ;  others  beaten  back  and  trampled 
down  so  often  that  each  effort  they  make 
to  rise  becomes  feebler  than  the  last ;  more 
still  crushed  into  stupid,  stolid  hopeless 
ness  ;  some  sacrificing  friends,  honor,  truth, 
to  outdo  the  struggling,  striving  wretches 
who  are  spurring  on  in  the  mad  race,  which 
all  hope  to  win,  and  after  years  of  hope  and 
toil  and  strong  belief  and  perhaps  final 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  35 

victory,  see  all  the  warm  glow  and  flush  of 
success  flicker  and  pale  and  fade  to  dull 
regret  that  it  comes  too  late.  This  is  the 
end ;  the  fruit  is  turned  to  ashes  !  Utter 
sadness  envelops  me  as  a  pall,  as  the  hope 
lessness,  the  uselessness  of  it  all  is  borne  in 
upon  me.  Ah,  mournful  are  these  moments 
of  isolation,  when  triumphs  dissolve  into  the 
air,  brilliancy  is  cast  aside  as  a  garment; 
when,  free  from  affectation,  we  stand  face 
to  face  with  our  real  selves,  in  that  solitude 
which  is  the  only  sincerity  of  the  soul !  We 
are  on  trial  before  the  most  pitiless  of  judges, 
and  every  thought  and  deed  rushes  forth  to 
witness  against  us.  /]  God  help  the  one  who 
is  self-condemned,  who  can  find  for  himself 
no  pardon  for  wrong  done,  no  palliation  ! 
Our  ideals  may  be  shattered,  and  with  a  sigh 
of  regret  we  march  on.  / 

Our  most  trusted  friends  may  deceive  us, 
and,  though  hearts  are  torn  with  grief,  we 
push  bravely  forward ;  but  when  we  our 
selves  have  stained  our  souls  by  acts  of 
which  we  proudly  deemed  ourselves  inca 
pable,  have  seen  the  fabric  of  character, 


36  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

a  fair  structure  reared  with  prudence  and 
sincerity,  crumble  in  a  moment,  —  ah,  then 
the  footsteps  falter,  the  way  grows  long,  the 
heart  weary. ) 

What  a  difference  in  the  way  memories 
grow  old  !  Some  incident  that  seemed  a 
trifle  at  the  time  of  happening  grows  more 
tender,  more  infinitely  dear,  as  the  days 
pass ;  and  I  wish  that  I  had  grasped  it  and 
upon  it  hung  all  the  hopes  and  ambitions  of 
a  lifetime.  Another,  which  seemed  equally 
unimportant,  grows  unpleasant,  loathsome, 
as  time  passes,  and  seems  to  throw  a  baleful 
gleam  over  the  whole  after-life.  How  true 
it  is  that  a  small  imprudence,  helped  by 
some  insignificant  accident,  as  an  acorn  is 
fertilized  by  a  drop  of  water,  may  raise  the 
tree  on  which  we  and  others  shall  be  cruci 
fied  !  It  is  the  fatal  spell  of  destiny.  From 
morning  to  night  we  are  scattering  the  seeds 
whose  harvest  we  cannot  foretell;  and  the 
soil  in  which  they  fall  is  the  human  heart, 
— a  soil  so  rich  that  of  all  those  seeds  none 
utterly  perish. 

Ah,  the  turning-points  in  our  lives,  upon 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  37 

which  we  rush  with  such  recklessness  ;  and 
yet  after  they  are  passed,  nothing  is  ever 
the  same,  and  nothing  can  restore  what  has 
been  lost  or  changed  !  i 

Memories  are  the  landmarks  of  the  past. 
Some  gleam  out  like  stars  in  the  dreary 
path,  shedding  radiance  and  joy;  some 
are  mournful  crosses,  gnarled  and  withered 
trees ;  some  the  ruins  of  happy  households  : 
all  of  them  helpful,  if  only  heeded,  toward 
rinding  one's  way  through  the  intricate  fields 
of  the  soul. 

Every  wanderer  has  thus  marked  his 
progress,  and  is  thus  enabled  to  trace  his 
thoughts,  his  motives,  his  results. 

What  a  wide  world  is  the  past !  —  a  great 
and  gorgeous,  a  rich  and  solemn  world. 
Fancy  fills  it  up,  artist-like ;  the  darkness 
is  mellowed  off  into  soft  shades,  the  bright 
spots  are  veiled  in  the  sweet  atmosphere  of 
distance,  and  fancy  and  memory  together 
make  up  a  rich  dreamland  of  the  past.  As 
in  a  lightning-flash  I  review  the  days  of  my 
past,  with  all  the  rapid  changes  of  my  life, 
—  back,  back,  my  mind  wanders  until  it 


38  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

reaches  the  home  of  youth,  the  village  around 
which  cluster  such  tender  memories. 

Life  may  and  does  change ;  but  we  are 
not  wrong  in  believing  that  the  thoughts 
and  loves  of  the  first  years  will  always  make 
part  of  our  lives.  We  could  never  love  the 
earth  so  well,  if  we  had  no  childhood  in  it, 
if  it  were  not  the  earth  where  the  same 
flowers  come  up  again  every  spring  that  we 
used  to  gather  with  our  tiny  fingers,  as  we 
sat  lisping  to  ourselves  on  the  grass.  What 
novelty  is  worth  that  sweet  monotony,  where 
everything  is  known,  and  loved  because  it 
is  known? 

What  grove  of  tropic  palms,  what  strange 
ferns  or  splendid  blossoms,  can  ever  thrill 
such  deep  and  delicate  fibres  within  me  as 
this  home  scene  ?  The  familiar  flowers,  the 
well-remembered  notes,  the  sky  with  its 
fitful  brightness,  the  furrowed  and  grassy 
fields,  —  such  things  as  these  are  the  mother 
tongue  of  our  imagination,  the  language  that 
is  laden  with  all  the  subtle,  inextricable  asso 
ciations  the  fleeting  hours  of  our  childhood 
left  behind  them. 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  39 

Our  delight  in  the  sunshine,  in  the  deep, 
bladed  grass,  to-day,  might  be  no  more  than 
the  faint  perception  of  weary  souls,  if  it  were 
not  for  the  sunshine  and  the  grass  in  the 
far-off  years,  which  still  live  in  us  and  trans 
form  our  perception  into  love,  —  those  hours 
which  all  one's  life  long  can  be  looked  back 
to  with  loving  remembrance,  which  can  gild 
and  beautify  the  most  sorrowful  lives.  It  is 
surely  a  mistake  to  think  that  the  memory 
of  past  delights  makes  present  pain  sharper. 
If  not,  why  do  we  so  universally  strive  to 
make  children  happy?  Is  it  not  because 
we  know  that  happiness  in  the  present  will 
give  a  sort  of  reflected  happiness,  even  in 
the  saddest  future?  Is  it  not  because  we 
know,  how  in  life's  bitterest  moments,  its 
most  barren  and  desolate  places,  we  feel  a 
warmth  about  our  hearts,  a  smile  about  our 
lips,  when  we  remember  the  old  home  days 
with  the  eager,  childish  interest  and  hopes, 
their  vividly  recollected  pleasures,  their  shel 
tered  luxuriance  of  fatherly  and  motherly 
love  ?  The  thought  of  those  hours  breeds  per 
petual  benediction,  —  a  benediction  which 


40  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

outlives  the  cares  and  troubles  of  later  life, 
which  we  may  carry  with  us  to  our  dying 
day,  and  find  perfected  indeed  in  that 
Unseen  where  all  we  have  willed,  or  hoped, 
or  dreamed  of,  shall  exist.  The  lives  of 
children  are  proverbially  and  retrospectively 
happy.  They  have  not  yet  trusted  and  been 
deceived ;  not  yet  loved  and  been  deserted ; 
not  yet  learned  that  flattery  means  self-inter 
est,  that  honor  in  the  eyes  of  men  may  be 
bought  at  the  cost  of  self-respect,  that  gold 
can  turn  to  rust,  and  success  grow  bitter  as 
the  apples  of  Sodom,  that  all  earth's  prom 
ises  that  glitter  so  temptingly  never  yet  have 
stood  the  test  of  time.  Yet  the  annoyances 
and  griefs  of  children  are  very  real  to  them, 
and  often  minor  chords  are  sounded  whose 
plaintive  melodies  echo  through  their  whole 
lives. 

It  was  years  ago  when  my  first  sorrow 
came,  like  a  chilling  frost,  repressing  every 
instinct,  stifling  every  impulse.  It  was  a 
sunny  day  in  early  spring. 

If  it  be  true  that  Nature  at  certain  mo 
ments  seems  charged  with  a  presentiment 


AFTER    THE  BALL,  41 

of  one  individual  lot,  must  it  not  also  be 
true  that  she  seems  unmindful,  unconscious 
of  another?  For  there  is  no  hour  that  has 
not  its  births  of  gladness  and  despair,  that 
does  not  bring  new  sickness  or  desolation, 
as  well  as  new  forces  to  genius  and  love. 
There  are  so  many  of  us,  and  our  lots  are 
so  different !  What  wonder,  then,  that  Na 
ture's  mood  is  often  in  harsh  contrast  with 
the  great  crises  of  our  lives?  On  this 
bright  day,  when  grief  seemed  so  discord 
ant,  and  fate  hid  her  cold  and  awful  face 
behind  a  radiant  veil,  beguiling  with  soft 
breezes  and  poisoning  with  violet-scented 
breath,  my  mother  died.  She  was  still  so 
beautiful,  and  seemed  so  young  and  full  of 
life  and  activity,  that  the  idea  of  separa 
tion  had  never  crossed  my  thoughts,  save 
as  a  very  distant  prospect,  softened  by  the 
gradations  of  age  and  by  the  shortness  of 
time  I  should  have  to  pass  in  the  world 
after  this  farewell. 

How  much  more  I  might  have  loved 
her  !  Do  we  ever  repent  our  tenderness 
to  one  we  have  lost?  If  we  could  only 


42  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

realize  how  short  life  is,  how  little  time  we 
have  for  gladdening  the  hearts  of  fellow- 
travellers,  would  we  ever  repress  a  kindly 
impulse,  a  glance  of  sunshine,  a  cheering 
word?  Oh,  be  swift  to  love,  make  haste 
to  be  kind,  ere  Death  leaves  us  to  mourn 
our  lost  opportunities  !  The  old,  old  fash 
ion,  —  Death  !  The  fashion  that  came  in 
with  our  first  garments,  and  will  last  un 
changed  until  our  race  has  run  its  course, 
and  the  wide  firmament  is  rolled  up  like 
a  scroll.  The  old,  old  fashion,  —  Death. 
Oh,  thank  God,  all  who  see  it,  for  that 
older  fashion  yet  of  Immortality !  Look 
upon  us,  angels  of  loved  ones,  with  regards 
not  quite  estranged,  when  the  swift  river 
bears  us  to  the  ocean  ! 

It  is  an  exquisite  and  beautiful  thing  in 
our  nature  that  when  the  heart  is  touched 
or  softened  by  some  happiness  or  affection 
ate  feeling,  or  in  the  warm  glow  of  triumph 
or  success,  the  memory  of  the  dead  comes 
over  it  most  powerfully  and  irresistibly.  It 
would  almost  seem  as  if  our  better  thoughts 
and  sympathies  were  charms  in  virtue  of 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  43 

which  the  soul  is  enabled  to  hold  some 
vague  and  mysterious  intercourse  with  the 
spirits  of  those  whom  we  dearly  loved  in 
life.  Alas,  how  often  and  how  long  may 
those  patient  angels  hover  about  us,  watch 
ing  for  the  spell  which  is  so  seldom  uttered 
and  so  soon  forgotten  ! 

Life  is  a  lonely  affair  at  best.  Only  a 
mother's  loving  instinct  ever  comprehends 
us,  and  when  that  is  gone  our  souls  are 
indeed  isolated. 

The  remoter  stars  seem  a  nebula  of 
united  light,  yet  there  is  no  group  that  a 
telescope  will  not  resolve;  and  thus  the 
dearest  friends  are  separated  from  us  by 
impassable  gulfs. 

"  Not  even  the  tenderest  heart  and  next  our  own 
Knows  half  the  reason  why  we  smile  or  sigh." 

Each  soul  lives  and  dies  alone.  How 
long  we  live  before  we  realize  that  life  is 
the  one  breath  we  breathe,  the  while  we  say, 
"  I  live ; "  before  we  are  content  to  draw 
from  every  day  its  fullest  uses  and  bene 
fits  unglorified  by  dreams  of  to-morrow; 


44  Iff  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

before  we  learn  that  whatever  effort  we  may 
make  to  touch  another  life,  it  can  but  end 
in  a  longing  that  is  never  satisfied  !  Day 
by  day  we  knit  bonds  that  bind  until  the 
blood  flows,  but  do  not  join ;  we  tremble 
for  the  life  of  this  one,  or  the  love  of  that 
one ;  we  feel  our  hearts  die  within  us,  be 
cause  this  life  has  passed  away  from  our 
grasp  or  that  love  has  failed  us  in  our  need. 
All  this  we  do,  fighting  through  our  little 
day;  and  when  the  end  comes,  we  must 
let  go  and  journey  out  along  the  "lonely 
road  "  without  a  footstep  timing  ours,  or  a 
hand  clasped  in  our  own. 

The  days  that  followed  this  sorrow  were 
very  dreary  ones ;  and  there  is  no  hope 
lessness  so  sad  as  that  of  early  youth,  when 
the  soul  is  made  up  of  wants,  full  of  eager, 
passionate  longings  for  all  that  is  beautiful 
and  glad,  thirsty  for  all  knowledge,  strain 
ing  after  dreamy  music  that  dies  away  and 
will  not  come  near,  with  no  long  memories, 
no  superadded  life  in  the  life  of  others ; 
though  older  friends,  who  look  on,  think 
lightly  of  such  premature  despair,  as  if  the 


AFTER    THE  BALL.  45 

vision  of  the  future  lightened  the  blind 
sufferer's  present. 

The  ambitions  and  rivalries  of  school- 
life,  its  first  boastful  importance  as  knowl 
edge  begins  to  dawn  on  the  awakened 
mind,  the  ripe  and  enviable  complacency 
of  its  senior  dignity,  —  all  blow  over  my 
memory,  like  the  morning  breeze  along  the 
meadows,  and  like  that,  too,  bear  upon  their 
wings  a  chilliness  as  of  distant  ice-banks. 
At  the  end  of  my  school-days  another  event 
occurred  that  made  me  pause  and  reflect 
upon  the  uselessness  of  the  petty  ambitions 
and  strivings  and  rivalries  of  the  school 
room,  which  is  only  life  in  miniature. 

No  wonder  I  paused  in  fear  and  trem 
bling  as  I  was  about  to  embark  on  that 
"  unknown  sea  "  on  which  sweet  girl  grad 
uates  so  eloquently  descant.  The  wide 
expanse  had  seemed  so  gay  with  ripple 
and  wave,  so  musical  with  ebb  and  flow. 
Yet  a  fear  crept  over  me  that  I  might  not 
make  the  voyage  in  safety,  for  did  I  not, 
right  on  the  eve  of  starting,  look  with  a 
pang  at  an  empty  shallop  beside  us,  whose 


46  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

dear  young  pilot  had  gone  down  before 
our  eyes,  ere  we  had  put  from  shore  ?  Yet 
she  had  stood  with  us  on  the  hither  side 
of  that  dark  and  troublous  sea  called  Life ; 
had  watched  with  us  the  pitching  and  toss 
ing  of  the  numberless  barks  that  had  gone 
before ;  had  seen  some  struggling  amid  the 
breakers,  others  going  to  pieces  on  the 
reefs ;  still  others  drifting,  dismantled  and 
shattered,  upon  a  shore  already  thick  strewn 
with  wrecks,  yet  had  dreamed  with  us  of 
smooth  and  sunny  paths,  across  that  piti 
less  waste  of  waters. 

Those  days  are  past  now.  The  quiet 
childhood  of  humanity,  spent  in  the  far- 
off  glades  and  by  the  murmuring  rivers,  is 
gone  forever ;  and  human  life  has  deepened 
to  womanhood  amid  tumult,  doubt,  and 
hope.  Its  age  of  restful  peace  is  past.  It 
has  its  work  to  finish  and  must  hasten  on. 
What  that  work  may  be,  what  this  world's 
share  is  in  the  great  Design,  we  know  not, 
though  our  unconscious  hands  are  helping 
to  accomplish  it.  Like  the  tiny  coral  in 
sect,  working  deep  under  the  dark  waters, 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  47 

we  strive  and  struggle,  each  for  our  own 
little  ends,  nor  dream  of  the  vast  fabric 
we  may  be  building  up  for  God. 

There  are  some  advantages,  too,  in  begin 
ning  life  with  tragedy.  It  belittles  all  the 
rest  into  the  province  of  the  light  comic. 
It  is  an  immense  safeguard  and  armor  of 
protection  to  be  at  the  bottom  indifferent. 
I  have  learned  to  take  the  world  genially 
instead  of  literally,  and  it  is  only  in  these 
quiet  moments  that  I  indulge  in  the  luxury 
of  woe.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  satisfac 
tion  sometimes  in  being  thoroughly  mis 
erable.  As  a  rule,  it  is  not  trouble  that 
makes  us  melancholy.  The  actuality  is  too 
stern  a  thing  for  sentiment.  We  linger  to 
weep  over  a  picture,  but  from  the  original 
we  should  quickly  turn  our  eyes  away. 
There  is  no  pathos  in  real  misery ;  no 
luxury  in  real  grief.  When  men  or  women 
love  to  brood  over  a  sorrow,  and  take  care 
to  keep  it  green  in  their  memory,  you  may 
be  sure  it  is  no  longer  a  pain  to  them. 

I  am  glad  when  I  see  Regret  walked  with 
as  a  friend,  —  glad  because  I  know  the  salt- 


48  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ness  has  been  washed  from  out  the  tears. 
Time  has  laid  his  healing  hand  upon  the 
wound,  when  we  can  look  back  upon  the 
pain  we  once  fainted  under,  and  no  bitter 
ness  or  despair  rises  in  our  hearts. 

The  burden  is  no  longer  heavy,  when  we 
have  for  our  past  troubles  only  the  same 
sweet  mingling  of  pleasure  and  pity  that 
we  feel  when  old  knight-hearted  Colonel 
Newcome  answers  "  Adsum  "  to  the  great 
roll-call,  or  when  Tom  and  Maggie  Tulliver, 
clasping  hands  through  the  mists  that  have 
divided  them,  go  down,  locked  in  each 
other's  arms,  beneath  the  swollen  waters  of 
the  Floss. 

Wise  men  may  continue  to  talk  of  the 
influence  of  mind  over  matter,  but  my 
thoughts  always  seem  to  take  tone  from 
my  physical  condition.  And  when  I  am, 
as  to-night,  "  so  tired,"  I  grow  melancholy. 
Then  I  stop  and  think  how  poor  the  in 
centives  and  objects  of  life ;  for  few  of  us 
risk  our  salvation  to  win  kingdoms  and 
provinces,  but  waste  what  is  best  and  no 
blest  in  us  by  teasing  anxieties  and  petty 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  49 

ambitions,  for  results  not  worth  the  striving 
for,  scarcely  worth  the  having  when  gained. 
Immortal  beings  though  we  are,  our  daily 
problems,  our  crying  necessities,  chiefly 
concern  the  questions  what  we  shall  eat, 
drink,  and  wear,  —  above  all,  how  shall  we 
answer  our  neighbors'  expectations  of  us 
and  put  a  good  foot  forward.  What  a 
feverish  contest  it  is !  Never  ending  is 
this  wild  procession.  Day  and  night  can 
be  heard  the  quick  tramp  of  myriads  of 
feet,  —  some  running,  some  walking,  some 
halting  and  lame,  but  all  hastening,  all 
eager  in  the  feverish  race ;  all  straining 
life  and  limb  and  heart  and  soul  to  reach 
the  ever  receding  horizon  of  success. 
Their  speed  never  slackens,  their  race 
never  ends.  There  is  no  wayside  rest,  no 
halt  by  cooling  fountains,  no  pause  be 
neath  green  shades.  On,  on,  on,  —  on, 
through  the  heat  and  the  crowd  and  the 
dust ;  on,  or  they  will  be  trampled  down 
and  lost;  on,  with  throbbing  brains  and 
trembling  limbs;  on,  till  the  heart  grows 
sick,  and  the  eyes  grow  blurred,  and  a 
4 


50  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

gurgling  groan  tells  those  behind  they  may 
close  up  another  space. 

The  words,  "  What  shall  it  profit?  "  ring 
in  the  ear  like  a  death-knell,  forming  a 
solemn  undertone  amid  the  laughter  of 
mirth  and  the  plaudits  of  success.  How 
we  waste  our  brain  tissue  in  trying  to 
philosophize,  and  answer  that  endless,  un 
answerable  question,  Cut  bono  ?  Only 
one  who  has  asked  this  question  in  bitter 
earnest,  and  fairly  faced  the  answer,  can 
know  the  horror,  the  blackness,  the  empti 
ness,  of  the  abyss  into  which  it  plunges. 

Retrospectively,  life  seems  nought  but  a 
crumbling  ruin,  —  a  shattered  column  there, 
where  a  massive  portal  stood ;  a  broken 
shaft  of  a  window  to  mark  a  temple  of  hap 
piness  ;  a  mouldering  heap  of  blackened 
stones,  where  the  glowing  flames  once 
leaped.  Regrets  and  broken  resolutions 
will  chase  over  the  soul  like  swift-winged 
night-birds,  and  all  the  unsteady  heights 
and  wastes  of  action  will  lift  up  distinctly 
and  clearly  from  the  uneasy  but  limpid 
depths  of  memory.  The  past  may  be  gray 


AFTER   THE  BALL.  51 

and  mysterious,  the  present  dark  and  full 
of  terrors;  but  there  is  still  a  glorious 
future  full  of  hope.  I  will  go  forth  to  meet 
that  shadowy  future  with  a  brave  heart,  and 
let  my  thoughts  revert  with  exquisite  sat 
isfaction  to  my  castles  in  Spain.  It  is  a 
country  famously  romantic.  My  castles 
are  in  perfect  proportions,  set  in  the  most 
picturesque  situations.  I  have  never  been 
to  Spain  myself,  and  it  is  not  easy  for  me 
to  say  how  I  know  as  much  as  I  certainly 
do  about  my  castles  in  Spain.  The  sun 
always  shines  upon  them.  They  stand 
lofty  and  fair  in  a  luminous  golden  at 
mosphere,  a  little  hazy  and  dreamy,  per 
haps,  like  Indian  Summer,  but  in  which  no 
gales  blow,  and  there  are  no  tempests. 
All  the  sublime  mountains  and  beautiful 
valleys  and  soft  landscapes  that  I  have  not 
yet  seen  are  to  be  found  in  the  grounds. 
There  is  wonderful  music  there  ;  sometimes 
I  awake  at  night,  and  hear  it.  It  is  full  of 
the  sweetness  of  youth,  and  love,  and  a 
new  world,  I  lie  and  listen ;  and  I  seem 
to  arrive  at  the  great  gates  of  my  estate. 


52  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

They  swing  open  upon  noiseless  hinges ; 
and  the  tropic  of  my  dreams  receives  me. 
Up  the  broad  steps,  whose  marble  pave 
ment  mingled  light  and  shadow  print  with 
shifting  mosaic,  beneath  the  boughs  of 
lustrous  oleanders  and  trees  of  unimagi 
nable  fragrance,  I  pass  into  the  vestibule, 
warm  with  summer  odors.  I  am  no  more 
alone.  Together  (sweet  word  that)  we 
move  on  in  company  with  noble  men  and 
beautiful  women;  and  through  days  and 
nights  of  eternal  summer  the  stately  revel 
of  our  life  proceeds. 

And  I  will  dream  my  dreams,  and  attend 
to  my  Spanish  possessions.  I  have  so 
much  property  there  that  I  cannot,  in 
conscience,  neglect  it.  All  the  years  of 
my  youth,  the  hopes  of  my  life,  are  stored 
away  like  precious  stones  in  the  vaults; 
and  I  know  that  I  shall  find  everything 
convenient,  elegant,  and  beautiful  when 
I  come  into  possession  of  my  castles  in 
Spain. 


AFTER   DINNER. 


AFTER  DINNER. 

"DREAKFAST  is  always  a  serious  time 
•*— '  for  me,  perhaps  from  an  intuitive 
perception  that  it  is  taken  at  the  beginning 
of  a  sacred  day,  —  a  day  with  all  its  possi 
bilities  and  chances  of  what  may  happen, 
the  fateful  day  which  may  change  the  whole 
course  and  current  of  a  life. 

In  the  evening  the  work  is  done.  I  still 
live,  and  have  passed  through  all  the  dan 
gers  of  the  day.  If,  counting  the  things  that 
I  have  done,  I  can  find  — 

"  One  self-denying  act,  one  word, 
That  eased  the  heart  of  him  who  heard, 

One  glance  most  kind, 
That  fell  like  sunshine  where  it  went, — 
Then  I  can  count  the  day  well  spent," 

and  can  laugh  and  be  merry  at  dinner. 

The  thought  that  comes  to  me  immedi 
ately  after  a  dinner-party  is  not  so  satis- 


56  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

factory.  It  is  what  the  French  term 
f  esprit  de  Fescalier,  the  bon  mot  that 
might  have  been  introduced,  the  retort 
that  might  have  been  given. 

A  clever  sculptor  that  was  who  designed 
Opportunity  as  a  god,  whose  face  was  cov 
ered  with  hair,  —  for  men  seldom  know 
him  when  he  comes  to  them,  —  and  with 
wings  to  each  foot,  because  once  gone,  he 
cannot  be  overtaken ;  I  have  good  author 
ity,  however,  for  the  consoling  thought  that 
though  it  is  nature  to  communicate  one's 
self,  it  is  culture  to  receive  what  is  com 
municated  ;  and  the  magnetic  experiment 
of  conversation  at  a  dinner-table  is  to  me 
the  most  charming  feature  of  society. 

I  have  beguiled  my  time  with  varied 
amusements  during  the  last  few  days. 

Last  night  I  went  to  the  opera.  It  was 
a  crowded  night ;  for  the  opera  was  one 
that  appealed  to  the  senses,  and  stimulat 
ing  them  to  activity,  left  the  mind  free  to 
pursue  its  own  schemes,  the  orchestra  and 
scenes  forming  an  accompaniment  and 
interpretation  of  the  private  dramas  in  the 


AFTER  DINNER.  57 

boxes.  (Is  not  all  music,  to  tender  and 
poetic  souls,  to  wounded  and  suffering 
hearts,  a  text  which  they  interpret  as  they 
need?) 

Is  not  the  charm  of  life  somewhat  de 
pending  upon  a  sense  of  its  fleetingness,  of 
its  phantasmagorical  character,  a  note  of 
coming  disaster  in  the  midst  of  its  most 
seductive  pageantry,  in  the  whirl  and  glit 
ter  and  hurry  of  it? 

Is  there  some  subtle  sense  of  exquisite 
satisfaction  in  snatching  the  sweet  moments 
of  life  out  of  the  very  delirium  of  it,  that 
must  soon  end  in  an  awakening  to  bank 
ruptcy  of  the  affections  and  the  dreadful 
loss  of  illusions?  Else,  why  do  we  take 
pleasure  —  a  pleasure  so  deep  that  it 
touches  the  heart  like  melancholy  —  in 
the  common  drama  of  the  opera? 

Do  we  like  it  because  it  is  life,  or  be 
cause  there  is  a  certain  satisfaction  in  seeing 
the  tragedy  which  impends  over  all,  per 
vades  the  atmosphere,  as  it  were,  and  adds 
something  of  zest  to  the  mildest  enjoy 
ment?  How  simple,  after  all,  was  the  ere- 


58  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ated  world  on  the  stage  to  the  real  world 
in  the  auditorium,  with  its  thousand  com 
plexities  and  dramatic  situations ;  and  if 
the  little  knot  of  players  of  parts  for  an 
hour  could  have  had  leisure  to  be  specta 
tors  of  the  audience,  what  deeper  revela 
tions  of  life  would  they  not  have  seen? 

Desire  for  the  dramatic  is  natural.  Peo 
ple  will  have  it  somehow.  In  the  country 
villages,  where  there  are  no  theatres,  the 
people  enjoy  the  story  of  each  other's 
lives ;  the  most  trivial  incidents  are  mag 
nified  and  talked  about,  —  dramatized,  in 
fact.  Good  theatres  thus  exert  the  whole 
some  influence  of  satisfying  the  natural 
appetite  for  that  gossip  from  which  noth 
ing  can  be  concealed,  everything  being 
used  to  create  that  illusory  spectacle  which 
the  stage  tries  to  give. 

This  afternoon  found  me  in  attendance 
upon  one  of  those  ingenious  contrivances 
for  amusement  in  this  agreeable  world, 
called  a  reception. 

If  an  angel  from  the  starry  skies  were 
sent  down  to  inspect  our  social  life,  and 


AFTER  DINNER.  59 

should  pause  at  the  entrance  of  a  house 
where  a  reception  is  in  progress,  he  would, 
I  am  sure,  be  sorely  puzzled  at  the  noise 
of  our  highest  civilization.  It  may  not  be 
perfect,  for  there  are  limits  to  human 
powers  of  endurance ;  but  it  is  the  best 
that  we  can  do.  It  is  not  a  chance  affair. 
There  are  selected,  picked  out  by  special 
invitation,  the  most  intelligent,  the  most 
accomplished,  the  most  beautiful,  the  best- 
dressed  persons  in  the  community.  The 
angel  would  notice  this  at  once ;  and  he 
would  be  astonished  at  the  number  of 
such  persons,  —  for  the  rooms  would  be  so 
crowded  that  he  would  see  the  hopeless 
ness  of  attempting  to  edge  or  wedge  his 
way  through  the  throng  without  tearing  off 
his  wings.  An  angel,  in  fact,  would  stand 
no  chance  in  one  of  these  brilliant  as 
semblies,  on  account  of  his  wings ;  and  he 
probably  could  not  be  heard,  on  account 
of  the  low,  heavenly  pitch  of  his  voice. 
Men,  by  reason  of  their  stolidity  and 
deeper  voices,  can  never  be  proficient  in 
the  art  of  screaming,  and  are  carefully 
excluded, 


60  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

If  half  a  dozen  ladies,  meeting  by  chance 
in  a  parlor,  should  converse  quietly  in  their 
sweet,  ordinary  home  tones,  it  might  be  in 
a  certain  sense  agreeable ;  but  it  would  not 
be  fashionable,  and  would  not  strike  the 
prevailing  note  of  our  civilization. 

With  restful  satisfaction  I  thought  of  the 
dinner  from  which  I  have  just  returned,  to 
which  I  had  been  summoned  to  meet  one 
of  the  most  famous  writers  of  the  day. 

With  great  interest  and  a  certain  amount 
of  dread  we  contemplate  contact  with  any 
of  these  glorious  gifted  ones,  who  have 
sung  of  joy  and  sorrow,  love  and  death, 
touching  our  hearts  to  quick  sympathy,  and 
soothing  many  an  hour  of  pain  and  weari 
ness.  What  a  glorious  achievement  to  pen 
even  a  few  words  which,  whenever  read, 
must  bring  a  throb  of  restful  pleasure  to 
a  human  heart !  What  a  gift  to  have  the 
transcendent  genius  that  turns  the  very 
stones  along  life's  road  to  precious  gems 
of  thought;  that  finds  speech  in  dumb 
things  and  eloquence  in  the  ideal  half  of 
the  living  world ;  that  genius  to  which  sor- 


AFTER  DINNER.  6 1 

row  is  a  melody,  and  joy  sweet  music,  to 
which  the  humblest  effort  of  a  humble  life 
can  furnish  an  immortal  lyric,  and  in  which 
one  thought  of  the  divine  can  inspire  a 
sublime  hymn. 

Nervously,  yet  happily,  I  looked  forward 
to  being  face  to  face  with  this  man,  upon 
whose  truth  and  philosophy  I  had  leaned 
as  upon  the  heart  of  a  friend.  He  had 
looked  into  the  human  heart  with  sym 
pathy  and  with  truth ;  and  in  every  line  I 
had  felt  the  noble  soul  that  throbbed 
behind  his  words. 

It  is  always  interesting,  I  think,  to  feel 
the  author  in  his  book.  I  do  not  mean 
that  confidential  appeal  to  the  "  gentle 
reader  "  made  by  the  old-fashioned  novel 
ist,  who  had  an  insinuating  way  of  drawing 
you  into  a  corner,  as  it  were,  away  from  the 
confusing  scenes  of  the  story.  If  any  dis 
aster  was  impending,  you  were  warned  of  it 
in  time.  "  But,  reader,  little  did  Arabella 
dream  in  her  thoughtless  mirth  that  she 
should  never  again  behold  the  scene  of  her 
childhood,"  etc. 


62  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

If  any  change  of  scene  was  made,  the 
writer  did  not  forget  you,  but  politely  re 
marked,  "  Come  with  me,  reader,  from  the 
glittering  halls  of  wealth  to  the  abode  of 
honest  penury."  By  this  means  it  was  kept 
plainly  before  your  mind  that  these  events 
were  only  things  in  a  book,  and  if  you  were 
unduly  moved  thereby,  it  was  your  own 
fault.  The  author  had  done  his  part  toward 
averting  from  you  a  dangerous  excess  of 
emotion. 

Relations  between  author  and  reader  are 
not  as  familiar  as  they  used  to  be.  Now  he 
tries  to  remain  neutral ;  he  states  the  case, 
and  will  not  attempt  to  prejudice  your  de 
cision,  and  he  only  gains  by  keeping  his 
personality  out  of  sight.  But  when  you 
divine  him  through  his  books;  when  his 
words  bear  unconscious  witness  to  what  he 
has  known  and  suffered,  —  then  your  inter 
est  is  quickened. 

It  must  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that 
there  are  certain  writers  who  have  the 
keenest  appreciation  of  the  aesthetic  value 
of  what  is  good  and  noble,  although  they 


AFTER  DINNER.  63 

may  be  blind  to  its  moral  import.  The 
tremor  of  feeling  in  their  voices,  the  shim 
mer  of  tears  in  their  eyes,  when  they  speak 
of  anything  humanly  pathetic,  is  not  as 
sumed,  but  for  the  moment  entirely  genuine. 
They  comprehend  the  loveliness  of  self- 
sacrifice,  though  they  have  no  notion  of 
practising  it ;  and  the  beggar  in  their  path 
is  a  picturesque  object  to  be  studied  of 
sketched,  not  a  creature  whose  necessities 
demand  relief. 

It  would  require  a  Machiavelian  reasoner 
to  reconcile  the  preaching  and  practice  of 
one  author,  who  gave  to  the  world  works 
which  revolutionized  the  educational  ideas 
of  his  time  and  inaugurated  a  movement 
toward  nature  and  simplicity,  yet  was  capa 
ble  of  abandoning  his  children  without  com 
punction  at  the  door  of  a  foundling  asylum. 

Think  of  the  vast  difference  between  the 
uttered  wisdom  and  acted  folly  of  another, 
who  wrote  solemnly :  "  Death  itself  to  the 
reflecting  mind  is  less  serious  than  marriage. 
Death  is  not  even  a  blow,  is  not  even  a 
pulsation ;  it  is  a  pause.  But  marriage  un- 


64  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

rolls  the  awful  lot  of  countless  generations." 
Afterwards,  seeing  an  attractive  young  wo 
man  in  the  glamour  of  the  ball-room,  he 
exclaimed,  "  By  Heaven  !  that 's  the  pret 
tiest  girl  in  the  room  ;  I  '11  marry  her."  He 
did,  and  was  as  wretched  as  might  have 
been  expected. 

It  seems  idle  to  waste  time  in  trying  to 
explain  remarkable  incongruities,  for  the 
weakness  of  the  flesh  will  sometimes  prevail 
over  the  strength  of  the  spirit.  Yet  it  is 
often  startling  to  note  how  the  intellect  will 
keep  itself  high  and  white  above  the  mire 
of  a  shameful  existence,  as  if  gifted  with 
some  immortal,  self-preserving  power. 

A  man  may  be  to  all  intents  and  pur 
poses  morally  degraded  beyond  redemption, 
yet  still  retain  the  bright  ideal  which  finds 
voice  in  the  words  that  seem  so  strangely 
at  variance  with  his  deeds.  All  is  not  lost 
till  that  is  destroyed.  It  is  a  matter  to  be 
regretted  that  the  hunger  for  personalities 
brings  the  author,  at  the  present  day,  so 
plainly  into  view. 

All  his  little  failings  and  absurdities,  com- 


AFTER  DINNER.  65 

raon  to  human  nature,  are  detailed  merci 
lessly,  making  us  wince  when  we  contrast 
them  with  the  words  that  have  inspired  us 
to  nobler  living.  What  does  it  profit  us 
to  know  that  one  maker  of  literature  is  an 
undutiful  son  or  a  pitiless  creditor?  How 
much  better  it  would  be,  if  to  us  they  could 
remain  beautiful,  mysterious  voices,  teach 
ing,  cheering,  and  consoling.  Contact  will 
dispel  illusions.  Humorists  are  never  funny, 
barristers  are  never  logical,  and  authors  fail 
to  materialize  into  that  airy  structure  we 
have  built  upon  their  own  words,  the  fan 
cied  personality  gleaming  through  pages  of 
glowing  sentiment  and  noble  truth ;  and  the 
book  itself  is  much  more  apt  to  become 
the  warm  friend  and  trusted  counsellor  than 
the  writer. 

What  a  lovable  friend  a  book  is  !  He  is 
the  master  who  instructs  without  rods  or 
ferules,  without  hard  words  or  anger,  and 
without  reward  or  money.  If  you  approach 
him,  he  is  not  asleep.  If  investigating  you 
interrogate  him,  he  conceals  nothing ;  if  you 
mistake  him,  he  never  grumbles ;  if  you  are 


66  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ignorant,  he  cannot  laugh  at  you.  We  rifle 
his  pockets  and  put  him  aside  at  our  pleas 
ure,  and  he  does  not  feel  neglected.  We 
invite  him  to  a  tete-a-tete  before  the  fire, 
and  fall  asleep  while  he  is  doing  his  best  to 
entertain  us,  yet  when  we  awake  his  counte 
nance  is  still  unruffled ;  doubtless  because 
all  the  time  he  is  aware  that  we  still  prize 
him.  What  strange  things  we  do  to  those 
whom  we  love  ! 

An  old  writer  says  :  "  No  matter  how  poor 
I  am,  no  matter  though  the  prosperous  of 
my  own  time  will  not  enter  my  obscure 
dwelling,  if  learned  men  and  poets  will  take 
up  their  abode  under  my  roof,  if  Milton 
will  cross  my  threshold  and  sing  to  me  of 
Paradise,  and  Shakespeare  open  to  me  the 
world  of  imagination  and  the  workings  of 
the  human  heart,  and  Franklin  enrich  me 
with  his  practical  wisdom,  —  winds  may 
blow  and  skies  may  rain,  fortune  may  prove 
unkind,  days  may  be  lonely  and  evenings 
dull ;  but  for  the  true  lover  of  reading  there 
is  always  at  hand  this  great  company  of 
companions  and  friends,  —  the  wisest,  the 


AFTER  DINNER.  6^ 

gentlest,  the  best,  never  too  tired  or  too 
busy  to  talk  with  him,  ready  at  all  moments 
to  give  their  thoughts  to  instruct  and  enter 
tain.  They  never  disappoint,  they  have  no 
moods  or  tempers,  they  are  always  at  home, 
—  in  all  of  which  respects  they  differ  from 
the  rest  of  our  acquaintance." 

To-night  I  turned  in  grievous  disappoint 
ment  from  this  author,  finding  in  him  a  man 
of  ordinary  appearance,  without  brilliancy  of 
speech  or  grace  of  manner.  As  I  listened 
to  hear  from  him  the  crystallization  of  a 
thought  that  would  perhaps  prove  an  inspi 
ration  to  me  through  months  to  come,  my 
amour  propre  was  deeply  wounded  at  his 
first  remark.  It  was  aggressively  common 
place,  relating  to  the  fine  condition  of  the 
atmosphere ;  revealing  a  desire  to  accom 
modate  his  genius  to  my  poor  feminine 
intellect,  and  a  belief  that  I  would  be  un 
able  to  fathom  the  meaning  of  a  remark  of 
deeper  significance. 

Most  men  disguise  their  thoughts  for  wo 
men,  as  if  to  venture  into  the  feminine  world 
were  as  dangerous  as  travelling  in  Africa. 


68  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

One  of  the  greatest  misfortunes  in  the 
intellectual  life  of  women  is  that  they  do 
not  hear  the  truth  from  men. 

All  men  in  cultivated  society  say  to  women 
as  much  as  possible  what  they  may  be  sup 
posed  to  wish  to  hear ;  and  women  are  so 
much  accustomed  to  this  that  they  almost 
resent  an  expression  of  opinion  which  takes 
no  account  of  their  personal  and  private 
feeling.  This  consideration  for  the  feelings 
of  women  gives  an  agreeable  tone  to  society, 
but  it  is  fatal  to  truth.  Observe  a  man  of 
the  world,  whose  opinions  are  well  known 
to  you ;  notice  the  little  pause  before  he 
speaks  to  a  lady.  During  that  pause  he  is 
turning  over  what  he  has  to  say,  so  as  to 
present  it  to  her  in  the  manner  that  will 
please  her  best,  and  you  may  be  sure  the 
integrity  of  truth  will  suffer  in  the  process. 
He  professes  to  take  an  interest  in  things 
he  does  not  care  for  in  the  least,  and  he 
passes  over  subjects  and  events  which  he 
knows  to  be  of  the  most  momentous  impor 
tance  to  the  world. 

The  lady  spends  an  hour  more  agreeably 


AFTER  DINNER.  69 

than  if  she  heard  opinions  which  would 
irritate,  and  prognostics  which  would  alarm, 
her,  but  she  has  missed  a  golden  opportu 
nity  for  culture;^ she  has  been  confirmed 
in  feminine  illusions.; 

Conversation  between  men  and  women 
will  always  be  partially  insincere  ;  the  high 
est  culture,  though,  has  a  direct  tendency 
to  command  sincerity  in  others,  because  it 
is  tolerant  of  variety  in  opinion,  and  because 
it  is  so  penetrating  that  dissimulation  is  felt 
to  be  of  no  use. 

As  women  increase  in  culture,  they  may 
expect  to  be  treated  by  men  with  more  of 
the  candor  and  frankness  they  bestow  upon 
each  other. 

By  the  side  of  an  uncultured  woman  a 
man  feels  that,  if  he  speaks  anything  differ 
ent  from  what  she  has  been  accustomed 
to,  she  will  take  offence ;  while  if  he  says 
anything  beyond  the  narrow  range  of  her 
information,  he  will  make  her  uncomfort 
able.  The  most  honest  of  men  in  such  a 
position  finds  it  necessary  to  be  cautious, 
and  can  scarcely  avoid  a  little  insincerity. 


70  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

But  with  a  woman  whose  culture  is  equal 
to  his  own,  these  causes  for  apprehensions 
have  no  existence,  and  he  can  safely  be 
more  himself.  Undoubtedly,  women,  if  not 
queens  and  victors,  are  the  law-givers  in 
the  art  of  conversation.  Madame  Necker 
compared  their  words  to  "light  layers  of 
cotton-wool  in  boxes  packed  with  porcelain : 
we  do  not  pay  much  attention  to  them,  but 
if  they  were  taken  away,  everything  would 
be  broken  to  pieces." 

Men,  however,  seek  the  society  of  women 
during  the  hours  of  mental  relaxation,  and 
find  such  a  charm  in  their  presence,  espe 
cially  when  they  are  magnetic  or  beautiful, 
that  they  are  not  apt  to  be  very  severe 
judges  of  the  abstract  intellectual  quality 
of  their  talk,  though 'they  realize  that  the 
pleasure  of  conversation  is  always  enhanced 
by  any  increase  of  knowledge. 

Talleyrand's  maxim  was,  that  if  you 
wanted  to  be  thought  agreeable  in  society, 
you  must  consent  to  be  taught  many  things 
that  you  know  already. 

A  wise  and  tactful  woman  who  wishes  to 


AFTER  DINNER.  71 

be  popular  with  mankind  (and  she  is  not 
wise  if  she  does  not)  will,  in  the  majority 
of  cases,  keep  her  intellect  subservient  to 
her  graces  and  charms  when  in  the  pres 
ence  of  men.  A  man  likes  a  woman's 
intellect  to  shine  brilliantly  in  its  full  force 
only  when  great  occasions  demand.  At 
other  times  he  likes  it  veiled  by  her  beauty 
and  modesty.  He  would  rather  it  would 
gleam  like  a  star  on  his  path,  or  suddenly 
glow  forth  in  shadowed  places  like  a  power 
ful  dark  lantern,  than  to  glare  always  about 
him  like  an  electric  light,  that  blinds  the 
eyes  of  his  egotism  and  offends  his  pride. 

Minds  can  so  easily  make  these  oppor 
tunities  for  culture  and  the  increase  of 
knowledge. 

When  one  woman  moans  she  has  no 
time  for  mental  culture,  another  makes 
her  chance. 

Often  when  sewing  or  dressing,  I  have 
before  me  a  book  with  marked  passages, 
or  a  newspaper  clipping,  that  I  am  conning 
again  and  again,  or  I  am  repeating  some 
verse  or  sentiment  that  has  struck  my  fancy. 


72  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

I  believe  that  the  most  delightful  and  satis 
factory  education  is  gained  in  this  way,  little 
by  little,  until  it  is  wrought  in  the  memory, 
is  a  part  of  one's  being,  and  seems  but  the 
echo  of  one's  own  thought. 

The  condiments  of  my  dinner  came  in 
the  person  of  my  right-hand  neighbor,  a 
cynic,  a  woman-hater,  a  pessimist,  one  who 
believed  nothing  but  what  he  saw,  and  then 
convinced  himself  that  he  was  the  victim 
of  an  optical  delusion,  —  one  of  those  select 
natures,  who  hold  that  all  great  men  are 
over-estimated,  and  small  men  are  insup 
portable  ;  that  if  you  would  ever  love  a 
woman  without  looking  back  upon  that 
love  as  folly,  she  must  die  while  you  are 
courting  her;  and  if  you  would  maintain 
the  slightest  belief  in  human  heroism,  you 
must  never  make  a  pilgrimage  to  see  the 
hero. 

If  I  talked  of  women,  he  said  he  had 
never  known  but  one  sensible  woman,  and 
she  was  the  one  that  declared  there  was 
only  one  fact  reconciled  her  to  being  a 
woman,  and  that  was,  She  would  not  have 
to  marry  one. 


AFTER  DINNER.  73 

When  marriage  was  discussed  (the  half- 
soul  and  other  equally  interesting  theories 
having  ardent  supporters),  he  called  our 
attention  to  the  wisdom  of  Dr.  Holmes, 
who  declared  that  there  are  at  least  five 
thousand  women  in  these  United  States, 
any  one  of  whom  the  most  fastidious  young 
man  would  marry  if  he  happened  to  be 
thrown  with  her  and  she  had  no  objection. 
And  to  dear  young  ladies  priding  them 
selves  on  their  discerning  delicacy,  he  says 
there  are  twenty  thousand  men,  any  one  of 
whom,  offering  his  hand  and  heart,  under 
favorable  circumstances,  they  would  first  en 
dure,  then  pity,  then  embrace.  He  agreed 
with  Buckle  that  the  number  of  marriages 
depends  altogether  upon  the  price  of  corn. 

We  talked  of  love,  —  we  discussed  the 
old  subject,  we  said  again  the  things  that 
have  been  said  so  often;  and  that  word 
"  love  "  which  came  back  ceaselessly,  now 
pronounced  by  a  strong  man's  voice,  now 
uttered  by  the  frail-toned  voice  of  a  woman, 
seemed  to  fill  the  room,  to  flutter  there  like 
a  bird,  to  hover  there  like  a  spirit. 


74  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

Can  one  remain  in  love  for  several  years 
in  succession?  Is  love  eternal?  "Yes," 
affirmed  some.  "No,"  maintained  others. 
We  distinguished  cases,  we  established  lim 
itations,  we  cited  examples;  and  all  men 
and  women,  filled  with  rising  and  troubling 
memories,  which  mounted  to  their  lips,  but 
which  they  could  not  quote,  seemed  moved, 
and  talked  of  that  common,  that  sovereign 
thing,  the  tender  and  mysterious  union  of 
two  beings,  with  profound  emotion  and 
ardent  interest.  Cupid  and  Psyche  !  The 
young  man  and  the  young  woman  who  are  in 
love  !  The  couple  which  is  constantly  van 
ishing  and  constantly  reappearing;  which 
has  filled  millions  of  various  situations,  and 
yet  is  always  the  same ;  symbolizing,  and 
one  might  almost  say  embodying,  the  doc 
trine  of  transmigration  of  souls ;  acting  a 
drama  of  endless  repetitions  with  innumer 
able  spectators. 

What  would  the  story-reading  world  — 
yes,  and  what  would  the  great  world  of 
humanity  —  do  without  these  two  figures? 
They  are  more  lasting,  they  are  more  im- 


AFTER  DINNER.  75 

portant,  and  they  are  more  fascinating  than 
even  the  crowned  and  laurelled  images  of 
heroes  and  sages.  When  men  shall  have 
forgotten  Alexander  and  Socrates,  Napoleon 
and  Humboldt,  they  will  still  gather  around 
the  imperishable  group,  —  the  youth  and 
the  girl  who  are  in  love.  Without  them  our 
kind  would  cease  to  be ;  at  one  time  or 
another  we  are  all  of  us  identified  with 
them  in  spirit ;  thus  both  reason  and  sym 
pathy  cause  us  to  be  interested  in  their 
million-fold  repeated  story.  And  the  old, 
old  story  of  clinging  hearts  is  more  fasci 
nating  from  age  to  age  as  human  thoughts 
become  purer  and  human  feelings  more 
delicate.  Love,  like  all  things  earthly,  is 
subject  to  the  processes  of  the  law  of  evo 
lution,  and  grows  with  the  centuries  to  be 
a  more  varied  and  exquisite  source  of  hap 
piness.  The  scoffing  cynic,  desirous  of 
strengthening  his  position  by  distinguished 
witnesses,  only  muttered  to  me  the  words 
of  Charles  O'Malley,  to  the  effect  that  what 
we  hear  of  single  or  only  attachments  is 
mere  nonsense.  Love,  like  everything  in 


76  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

the  world,  requires  a  species  of  cultivation. 
The  mere  tyro  in  an  affair  of  the  heart 
thinks  he  has  exhausted  all  its  pleasures 
and  pains;  but  only  he  who  has  made  it 
his  daily  study  for  years,  familiarizing  his 
mind  with  every  phase  of  the  passion,  can 
properly  or  adequately  appreciate  it.  The 
more  you  love,  the  better  you  love,  etc. 

To  recover  from  the  wounds  my  vanity 
received  during  this  conversation,  and  to 
regain  the  usual  contentment  with  my  lot, 
I  betook  myself  as  soon  as  I  reached  home 
to  the  pages  of  Ruskin  for  consolation. 
Proudly  I  read  :  — 

Shakespeare  has  no  heroes ;  he  has  only 
heroines.  In  his  labored  and  perfect  plays 
there  is  no  hero,  but  almost  always  a  per 
fect  woman,  steadfast  in  grave  hope  and 
errorless  purpose.  The  catastrophe  of  every 
play  is  caused  always  by  the  folly  or  fault  of 
a  man,  the  redemption,  if  there  be  any,  by 
the  wisdom  and  virtue  of  a  woman.  (Me- 
thinks  I  hear  the  mocking  tones  exclaim, 
"for  instance,  Lady  Macbeth,  Ophelia, 
Goneril,  and  Petruchio's  sweet  and  gentle 


AFTER  DINNER.  77 

Kate.")  In  all  cases  with  Scott,  as  with 
Shakespeare,  it  is  the  woman  who  watches 
over  and  guides  the  youth,  it  is  never  by 
any  chance  the  man  who  watches  over  or 
educates  her.  ("Yes,"  my  scoffer  contin 
ues,  "  Meg  Merrilies,  Effie  Deans,  and  Rob 
Roy's  freckled-faced,  red-headed,  angelic 
Helen.") 

Dante's  great  poem  is  a  song  of  praise 
for  Beatrice's  watch  over  his  soul ;  she  saves 
him  from  hell,  and  leads  him  star  by  star 
up  into  heaven.  (Whose  voice  suggests 
that  conjugal  devotion  should  have  led  him 
to  apostrophize  the  charms  of  his  wife, 
Gemma,  from  whom  he  was  forced  to  sep 
arate  ;  and  that  his  vision  of  hell  was  a 
faint  reflex  of  his  domestic  felicity?) 

The  cynic  is  incorrigible ;  but  before  he 
so  ruthlessly  condemns,  let  him  first  com 
prehend  the  heart  of  woman,  for  if  any 
man  says  that  he  understands  woman,  he 
is  convicted  of  folly  by  his  own  speech. 

Of  men,  it  may  be  sufficient  to  say  with 
David  that  they  are  all  liars,  though  it  may 
be  allowed  that  some  are  curable  of  the 


78  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

vice  of  falsehood.  Of  women,  however, 
there  is  no  general  statement  that  is  true. 
The  one  is  brave  to  heroism,  the  next 
cowardly  to  a  degree  fantastically  comic ; 
the  one  is  honest,  the  other  faithless ;  the 
one  contemptible  in  her  narrowness  of  soul, 
the  other  supremely  noble  in  broad  truth 
as  the  angels  in  heaven ;  this  one  gentle  as 
a  dove,  that  one  grasping  and  venomous 
as  a  serpent.  The  hearts  of  women  are  as 
the  streets  of  a  great  town,  some  broad  and 
straight  and  clean,  some  dim  and  strange 
and  winding;  or  as  the  buildings  of  this 
same  city,  wherein  there  are  holy  temples 
at  which  men  worship  in  calm  and  peace, 
and  dens  where  men  gamble  away  their 
souls.  Does  any  man  boast,  then,  that  he 
knows  the  heart  of  a  woman  ? 
j  The  heart  of  woman  containeth  all 
things  good  and  evil ;  and  woman  in  all 
her  weakness  is  the  strongest  force  upon 
the  earth.  She  is  the  helm  of  all  things 
human ;  she  comes  in  many  shapes,  and 
knocks  at  many  doors.  She  is  quick  yet 
patient,  and  her  passion  is  not  ungovern- 


AFTER  DINNER.  79 

able  like  that  of  a  man,  but  as  a  gentle 
steed  she  can  guide  e'en  as  she  will,  and 
as  occasion  offers  can  now  bit  up  and  now 
give  rein.  She  has  a  captain's  eye,  and 
strong  must  be  that  fortress  of  the  heart  in 
which  she  finds  no  place  of  vantage.  Does 
thy  heart  beat  fast  in  youth  ?  She  will  out 
run,  nor  will  her  kisses  tire. 

Art  thou  set  towards  ambition?  She 
will  unlock  thy  inner  heart  and  show  thee 
roads  that  lead  to  glory.  Art  thou  worn 
and  weary  ?  She  has  comfort  in  her  breast. 
Art  thou  fallen  ?  She  can  lift  thee  up,  and 
to  the  illusion  of  thy  senses  gild  defeat  with 
triumph. 

She  can  do  all  these  things,  for  Nature 
ever  fights  upon  her  side ;  and  while  she 
does  them,  she  can  deceive  and  shape  a 
secret  end  in  which  thou  hast  no  part. 
And  thus  woman  rules  the  world.  She  is 
thy  slave,  O  man,  yet  holds  thee  captive. 
At  her  touch  honor  withers,  locks  open, 
and  barriers  fall.  She  is  infinite  as  ocean, 
variable  as  heaven,  and  her  name  is  the 
Unforeseen.  \ 


80  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

The  statement  was  recently  set  afloat 
that  George  Meredith  understood  and  de 
picted  woman  better  than  any  one  who 
had  preceded  him ;  and  I  have  heard  men 
wonder  if  this  be  true,  or  only  a  wily  state 
ment  to  throw  men  again  off  the  track. 
Wise  women  encourage  this  notion  of  mys 
tery,  and  men  generally  accept  it.  Mr. 
Warner,  however,  is  of  the  opinion  that 
women,  conscious  of  inferior  strength,  have 
woven  this  notion  of  mystery  about  them 
selves  as  a  defence ;  and  he  insists  that  if 
novelists  and  essayists  have  raised  a  mist 
about  the  sex,  in  which  it  wilfully  mas 
querades,  it  is  time  that  scientists  should 
determine  whether  the  mystery  is  in  nature 
or  only  in  imagination.  Women  are  not 
very  mysterious  objects  to  each  other. 
Men  can  deceive  men,  men  may  occasion 
ally  hoodwink  women,  or  be  hoodwinked 
by  them;  but  it  has  not  been  given  to 
one  woman  to  throw  dust  in  the  eyes  of 
another.  The  silliest  girl  can  see  through 
the  most  astute  as  though  she  were  of 
glass. 


AFTER  DINNER.  8 1 

Historically,  it  would  be  interesting  to 
trace  the  rise  of  this  notion  of  women  as 
an  enigma.  The  savage  race  does  not  ap 
pear  to  have  it.  A  woman  to  the  North 
American  Indian  is  a  simple  affair,  dealt 
with  without  circumlocution.  In  the  Bible 
records  there  is  not  much  mystery  about 
her,  and  there  is  no  evidence  that  the 
Egyptian  woman  was  more  difficult  to  un 
derstand  than  the  Egyptian  man. 

It  was,  I  believe,  in  mediaeval  times  and 
the  chivalric  ages  that  women  were  first  set 
up  as  being  more  incomprehensible  than 
men,  —  that  is,  less  logical,  more  whimsical, 
more  uncertain  in  their  mental  processes. 
The  writers. of  the  seventeenth  and  eigh 
teenth  centuries  always  took  an  investigat 
ing  and  speculative  attitude  toward  woman, 
and  Montaigne  seems  specially  to  regard 
her  as  a  mystery. 

Some  one  (that  anonymous  person  who 
is  always  saying  the  wisest  and  most  de 
lightful  things  just  as  you  are  on  the  point 
of  saying  them  yourself)  has  said  recently 
that  the  mysteriousness  of  the  soft  sex  is  a 
6 


82          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

tradition  only,  and  women  are  as  easy  to 
understand  as  men  (honest  creatures  !),  if 
only  one  did  not  blind  one's  capability  of 
understanding  them  by  presupposing  them 
to  be  darkly  complex.  This  opinion,  com 
ing  from  one  of  our  keenest  pens,  made 
a  decided  impression ;  but  that  impression 
was  shortly  afterwards  blurred  by  reading 
a  story  by  the  same  writer,  into  which  he 
introduces  women  most  irrelevant  and  un 
reasoning,  the  most  feminine  of  the  sex, 
and  makes  remarks  about  them  like  these  : 
"Who  knows  what  is  in  a  woman?  How 
many  moods  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour?  And 
which  is  the  characteristic  one?  "  His  first 
utterances  were  in  the  nature  of  an  essay ; 
his  story  was  life.  However,  in  spite  of 
science  and  reason,  she  sits  like  a  sphinx 
and  smiles ;  and  no  man  has  yet  read  all 
the  riddle  of  her  smile,  or  known  all  the 
mystery  of  her  heart. 

Wise  women,  too,  will  continue  artfully 
to  foster,  in  the  eyes  of  men,  this  conceit  of 
their  separateness  and  veiled  personality. 

Man  is  by  nature  a  discoverer.     He  likes 


AFTER  DINNER.  83 

suggestions,  glimpses,  possibilities.  A  flash 
of  an  eye  under  a  veil,  the  gleam  of  a  white 
neck  under  soft  filmy  stuff,  are  more  effec-  , 

^r 

tive  with  him  than  the  steady  look  of  an 
unveiled  face  or  the  most  decollete  gown 
ever  worn.  So,  too,  a  fleeting  glimpse 
of  individuality,  a  suggestion  of  the  real 
woman,  stirs  him,  sets  him  thinking,  won- . 
dering,  longing  to  explore  the  hidden 
treasures  of  a  personality. 

And  the  woman  who  can  whet  curiosity, 
give  vague,  shadowy  hints  of  her  real  self, 
can  allure,  repel,  cajole,  command,  grow  / 
scornful  and  tender  in  one  breath,  battle 
bravely  and  yield  gracefully,  is  the  woman 
of  all  women  who  will  fascinate  men.  .  .  . 

It  has  been  said  that  flippant  minds  are 
readiest  in  speech,  because  their  supply  of 
ideas  is  so  limited  that  they  have  only  to 
hurry  them  forth.  Well-stored  minds,  in 
pausing  to  reflect  which  of  their  theories 
or  opinions  shall  be  advanced,  proceed 
more  slowly,  and  are  rarely  fluent. 

Perhaps  this  is  the  reason  that  the 
conversation  this  evening,  in  spite  of  the 


i 


84  fN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

intellect  and  talent  gathered  there,  was 
commonplace.  It  is  true,  however,  that 
the  commonplace  needs  no  defence,  since 
everybody  takes  to  it  and  thrives  upon  it. 
Great  is  the  power  of  the  commonplace. 

Beloved  and  read  and  followed  is  the 
writer  or  preacher  of  the  commonplace. 
Is  not  the  sunshine  common,  and  the 
bloom  of  May?  Why  struggle  with  these 
things  in  literature  or  in  life?  Why  not 
settle  down  upon  the  formula  that  to  be 
platitudinous  is  to  be  happy? 

When  one  of  us  who  has  been  led  by 
native  vanity  or  senseless  flattery  to  think 
himself  possessed  of  talent  arrives  at  the 
conclusion  that  he  or  she  is  ordinary  or 
even  dull,  it  is  one  of  the  most  tranquilliz 
ing  and  blessed  convictions  that  can  enter 
a  mortal's  mind.  All  our  failures,  all  our 
shortcomings,  our  strange  disappointments 
in  the  effects  of  our  own  efforts,  are  lifted 
from  our  bruised  shoulders,  and  fall  like 
Christian's  pack  at  the  feet  of  that  Omnipo 
tence  which  has  seen  fit  to  deny  us  the 
pleasant  gift  of  high  intelligence,  and  made 
us  commonplace. 


AFTER  DINNER.  85 

In  any  gathering,  how  little  we  have  to 
boast  in  the  way  of  conversation  !  Locke, 
when  in  company  with  certain  English  lords 
renowned  for  their  wit,  amused  himself  by 
taking  down  the  conversation,  and  caused 
them  to  roar  with  laughter  as  he  read 
aloud  the  result  and  asked  them  to  say 
what  they  could  make  of  it.  The  truth  is, 
the  upper  classes  in  all  nations  have  a 
certain  jargon  and  glitter  of  talk,  which,  if 
burned  in  the  embers  of  literary  or  philo 
sophical  thought,  would  leave  a  very  small 
residuum  of  gold  in  the  crucible. 

When  one  reflects  how  much  of  conver 
sation  is  mere  purposeless  impulse  or  habit, 
and  how  few  talkers  express  their  real  final 
sentiments,  it  seems  that  no  one  should 
be  held  altogether  accountable  for  what 
he  has  said.*  Nothing  so  surely  kills  the 
freedom  of  talk  as  to  have  some  matter- 
of-fact  person  instantly  bring  you  to  book 
for  some  impulsive  remark  flashed  out  on 
the  instant,  instead  of  playing  with  it  and 
tossing  it  about  in  a  way  that  shall  expose 
its  absurdity  or  show  its  value. 


86  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

A  person  cannot  tell  very  well  what  he 
does  think  till  his  thoughts  are  exposed  to 
the  air,  and  it  is  the  bright  fallacies  and 
impulsive  rash  ventures  that  are  most  fruit 
ful  to  talkers  and  listeners.  I  have  seen 
the  most  promising  paradox  come  to  grief 
by  a  simple  "  Do  you  think  so  ?  " 

Racy,  entertaining  talk  is  only  exposed 
thought,  and  no  one  would  hold  a  man 
responsible  for  the  thronging  thoughts  that 
contradict  and  displace  each  other  in  his 
mind. 

A  man  had  better  be  silent  if  he  may 
not  launch  into  the  general  talk,  the  whfrn 
and  fancy  of  the  moment;  or  if  he  can 
only  say  to-day  what  he  will  stand  by 
to-morrow,  for  fear  of  being  considered 
inconsistent.  None  of  us  seem  able  to 
shake  off  that  reverence  for  a  past  act  or 
word,  for  we  realize  that  the  eyes  of  others 
have  no  other  data  for  computing  our  orbit 
than  our  past,  and  we  are  loath  to  disap 
point  them.  Why  drag  about  this  corpse 
of  your  memory,  lest  you  contradict  what 
you  have  said  in  this  place  or  that  place  ? 


AFTER  DINNER.  87 

Mr.  Emerson  assures  us  that  a  foolish  con 
sistency  is  the  hobgoblin  of  little  minds, 
adored  by  little  statesmen,  philosophers, 
and  divines.  With  consistency  a  great  soul 
has  simply  nothing  to  do.  He  may  as 
well  concern  himself  with  his  shadow  on 
the  wall.  Speak  what  you  think  now,  and 
to-morrow  speak  what  to-morrow  thinks, 
though  it  contradict  everything  you  have 
said  to-day. 

All  original,  independent  action  exerts 
a  powerful  magnetism.  The  soul  always 
hears  an  admonition  in  originality  on  any 
subject.  The  sentiment  it  instils  is  more 
valuable  than  the  thought  it  contains. 

To  believe  your  own  thought,  to  believe 
that  what  is  true  for  you  in  your  private 
heart  is  true  for  all  men,  that  is  genius. 

A  man  should  learn  to  detect  and  watch 
that  gleam  of  light  from  within  more  than 
the  lustre  of  the  firmament  of  bards  and 
sages.  Yet  he  dismisses  without  notice  this 
thought,  because  it  is  his  own. 

In  every  work  of  genius  we  recognize 
our  own  rejected  thoughts ;  they  come  back 


88  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

to  us  with  a  certain  alienated  majesty.  I 
believe  any  man  can  be  really  great  if  he 
will  only  trust  his  own  instincts,  think  his 
own  thoughts,  and  say  his  own  say.  The 
stupidest  fellow,  if  he  would  only  reveal 
with  child-like  honesty  how  he  feels  and 
thinks  when  the  stars  wink  at  him,  when 
he  sees  the  ocean  for  the  first  time,  when 
music  comes  over  the  waters,  or  when  he 
and  his  beloved  look  into  each  other's  eyes, 
—  could  he  but  reveal  this,  the  world  would 
hail  him  as  a  genius,  and  would  prefer  his 
story  to  all  the  epics  that  ever  were  written 
from  Homer  to  Scott. 

Intelligence  having  been  insulted  by  the 
condescending  author,  my  sensibility  was 
wounded  later  in  the  evening.  A  youth 
with  a  simpering  admiration  informed  me 
that  I  was  "Such  a  flirt,"  —  the  suggestive 
pause  convincing  me  that  he  shared  the 
general  impression  of  misguided  youths, 
who  fancy  that  to  be  a  flirt  is  the  summum 
bonum  of  a  woman's  ambition,  and  that  he 
can  offer  her  no  more  intoxicating  incense 
than  the  expression  of  such  an  opinion. 


AFTER  DINNER.  89 

I  hate  a  flirt,  and  almost  agree  with  Dr. 
Talmage,  that  "  flirtation  is  damnation."  A 
flirt  must  necessarily  have  a  coarse-grained 
soul,  —  well  modulated  and  well  tutored, 
but  there  is  no  fineness  in  it.  All  its  native 
fineness  is  coarsened  by  coarse  efforts  of 
the  will.  True  feeling  is  a  rustic  vulgarity 
the  flirt  does  not  tolerate,  yet  she  will  play 
you  off  a  pretty  string  of  sentiment  she  has 
gathered  from  the  poets,  and  adjusts  it  as 
prettily  as  a  Gobelin  weaver  adjusts  the 
colors  in  his  broidery.  She  shades  it  off 
delightfully.  There  are  no  bold  contrasts, 
but  a  most  artistic  mellowing  of  tints.  She 
smiles  like  a  wizard,  and  jingles  a  laugh 
such  as  tolled  the  poor  home-bound  Ulysses 
to  the  Circean  bower.  Her  words  sparkle 
and  flow  hurriedly  and  with  the  prettiest 
doubleness  of  meaning.  Naturalness  she 
copies,  yet  scorns.  She  measures  her  wit 
by  the  triumphs  of  her  art.  She  chuckles 
to  herself  over  her  own  falsity.  She  is 
always  gay  because  she  has  no  depth  of 
feeling  to  be  stirred. 

She  counts  on  marriage  not  as  the  great 


90  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

absorbent  of  a  heart's  love  and  life,  but  as 
a  feasible  and  orderly  conventionality,  to 
be  played  with  and  kept  at  a  distance,  and 
finally  to  be  accepted  as  a  cover  for  the 
faint  and  tawdry  sparkles  of  an  old  and 
cherished  heartlessness.  She  will  not  pine 
under  any  regrets,  because  she  has  no  ap- 

Ipreciation  of  any  loss;,  she  will  not  chafe 
at  indifference,  because  it  is  her  art;  she 
will  not  be  worried  with  jealousies,  because 
she  is  ignorant  of  love.  With  no  concep 
tion  of  the  soul  in  its  strength  and  fulness, 
she  sees  no  lack  of  its  demands.  A  thrill 
she  does  not  know,  a  passion  she  cannot 
imagine ;  joy  is  a  name,  grief  is  another ; 
and  Life,  with  its  crowding  scenes  of  love 
and  bitterness,  is  a  play  upon  the  stage. 

I  tread  on  delicate  ground,  —  ground, 
alas,  which  many  a  girl  treads  boldly,  scat 
tering  much  feather-bloom  from  the  wings 
of  poor  Psyche,  gathering  for  her  hoards  of 
unlovely  memories,  and  sowing  the  seed  of 
many  a  wish  that  she  had  done  differently. 
They  cannot  pass  over  such  ground,  and 
escape  having  their  natures  more  or  less 


AFTER  DINNER.  91 

vulgarized.  I  do  not  speak  of  anything 
counted  wicked,  but  of  gambling  with  the 
precious  and  lovely  things  of  the  deepest 
human  relation.  If  a  woman  with  such  an 
experience  marry  a  man  she  loves,  will  not 
she  now  and  then  remember  something  it 
would  be  joy  to  discover  she  had  but 
dreamed  ? 

What  will  the  true  king  have  when  he 
comes  to  his  throne  if  his  golden  tribute 
has  been  wasted  on  every  passer-by? 

There  is  a  distinction  to  be  made  be 
tween  coquetry  and  flirtation;  and  no 
attractive  woman  is  free  from  a  certain 
amount  of  coquetry.  A  coquette  sparkles ; 
but  it  is  more  the  sparkle  of  a  harmless 
and  pretty  vanity  than  of  calculation.  She 
only  whets  the  appetite,  while  a  flirt  de 
praves  it.  She  does  not  regard  all  men  as 
possible  lovers.  Perhaps  a  day  will  come 
when  the  clear,  sparkling  eyes  will  droop, 
and  the  brave  mouth  tremble,  in  the  pres 
ence  of  a  man ;  but  not  for  every  man 
does  she  lose  her  sweet  freedom  and 
fearlessness. 


tW-  -  r^-ec-; 


92  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

Ah,  Mr.  Bachelor,  you  see  a  coquette 
in  your  revery,  dancing  before  you  with 
sparkling  smile,  teasing  you  with  the  pret 
tiest  graces  in  the  world,  maddening  you 
with  hope  and  fear ;  but  as  you  watch  her 
with  your  whole  soul  in  your  eyes,  you  see 
her  features  relax  to  pity,  as  a  gleam  of 
sensibility  comes  stealing  over  her  spirit, 
and  then  to  a  kindly,  feeling  regard.  And 
if  you  could  whisper  some  of  these  vagaries 
that  grow  on  your  fancy  in  lonely  hours 
into  her  listening  and  loving  ears,  —  ears 
not  tired  of  listening  because  it  is  you  who 
whisper ;  ears  ever  indulgent  because  eager 
to  praise,  —  and  if  your  darkest  fancies 
were  lit  up  by  a  ringing  laugh  from  that 
sweet  face  turned  up  in  fond  rebuke,  how 
far  better  than  to  be  waxing  black  and 
sour  over  pestilential  humors  alone  !  And 
if,  when  a  glowing  thought  comes  to  your 
brain  quick  and  sudden,  you  could  tell  it. 
over  as  a  second  self  to  that  sweet  crea 
ture,  who  is  not  away  because  she  loves  to 
be  there ;  and  if  you  could  watch  the 
thought  catching  that  girlish  mind,  illumin- 


AFTER  DINNER.  93 

ing  that  fair  brow,  sparkling  in  those  plea- 
santest  of  eyes,  —  how  far  better  than  to 
feel  it  slumbering  and  going  out,  heavy, 
lifeless,  dead  in  your  own  selfish  fancy. 
And  if  a  generous  emotion  steals  over  you, 
coming  you  know  not  whither,  would  there 
not  be  a  richer  charm  in  lavishing  it  in  a 
caress  or  endearing  word  upon  that  fondest 
and  most  cherished  one  than  in  patting  your 
glossy-coated  dog  or  sinking  in  loneliness  to 
your  slumbers? 

If,  in  short,  you  were  no  bachelor,  but 
the  husband  of  some  sweet  image,  and  in 
that  chair  yonder  were  seated  a  sweet-faced, 
true-hearted  woman,  and  if  you  could  reach 
an  arm  round  that  chair-back,  without  fear 
of  giving  offence,  and  suffer  your  fingers 
to  play  idly  with  those  curls  that  escape 
down  the  neck;  and  if  you  could  clasp 
with  your  other  hand  those  little,  white 
fingers  of  hers,  which  lie  so  temptingly 
within  reach,  and  inspired  by  her  sweet 
sympathy  talk  softly  and  low,  —  the  hours 
would  slip  by  without  knowledge,  and  the 
winter  winds  whistle  uncared  for. 


94  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

And  if  she  should  turn  her  head  daintily 
to  one  side,  and  look  lovingly  into  your 
eyes,  and  your  fingers  should  close  fast  and 
passionately  over  her  hand,  like  a  swift 
night-cloud  shrouding  the  pale  tips  of  Dian, 
and  your  eyes  should  draw  nearer  to  her 
laughing,  teasing,  loving  eyes;  and  you 
should  clasp  her  shadowy  form,  and  your 
lips  should  feel  the  warm  breath,  growing 
warmer  and  warmer,  —  would  you  then,  O 
scoffing  Bachelor,  so  gladly  banish  her  to 
Dreamland? 


AFTER  CHURCH. 


AFTER    CHURCH. 

"  TF  I  have  all  faith,  so  that  I  can  move 

•*-  mountains,  and  have  not  Love,  I  am 
nothing." 

Two  types  of  ministers  dwell  persistently 
in  my  mind  to-night,  suggested  by  the  ser 
vices  of  the  day. 

The  first,  the  Reverend  Dismal  Hor 
ror,  author  of  that  profitable  volume, 
"  Groans  from  the  Bottomless  Pit  to  awaken 
Sleeping  Sinners."  He  was  a  rousing 
young  dissenting  preacher,  who  had  fright 
ened  into  fits  half  the  women  and  children 
and  one  or  two  old  men  of  his  congrega 
tion,  giving  out  among  several  similarly 
cheerful  intimations  that  they  must  all 
necessarily  be  damned,  unless  they  imme 
diately  set  about  making  themselves  as 
miserable  as  possible  in  this  world. 

He  had  proved  to  his  trembling  female 
hearers,  in  effect,  that  there  was  only  one 
7 


98  IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

way  to  heaven,  —  through  his  chapel ; 
that  the  only  safe  mode  of  spending  their 
time  on  earth  was  reading  such  blessed 
works  as  that  which  he  had  just  published, 
and  going  daily  to  prayer-meeting.  On 
Sunday  he  had  preached  a  sermon,  "  to 
improve  the  death  "  —  such  being  his  im 
pressive  phrase  —  of  a  Miss  Snooks,  who 
had  not  been  a  member  of  his  congrega 
tion,  who,  having  been  to  the  theatre  on  a 
Thursday  night,  was  taken  ill  on  a  Friday, 
and  was  a  lifeless  (  ?)  corpse  when  the  next 
Sunday  dawned.  So  the  minister  this 
morning  railed  of  Progressive  Euchre 
(which  he  declared  was  rightly  named, 
because  it  was  progressing  to  the  devil) ,  and 
pointed  out  with  awful  force  and  distinct 
ness  how  cards  and  novels  were  the  devil's 
traps  to  catch  souls,  and  balls  and  the 
atres  easy  cuts  to  —  !  And  men  who  had 
defrauded  their  neighbors,  got  the  best  of 
a  little  business  transaction,  as  it  were, 
women  with  slanderous  tongues  or  violent 
tempers,  who  had  deprived  each  other  of 
honor  and  purity,  or  who  had  destroyed 


AFTER  CHURCH.  99 

the  peace  and  sanctity  of  their  own  homes 
by  words  that  sever  hearts  more  than 
sharp  swords,  nodded  in  a  gratified  ap 
proval,  and  uttered  loud  and  sonorous 
"  Amens." 

In  powerful  contrast  to  this  style  is  the 
Reverend  Morphine  Velvet.  His  is  a 
fashionable  church,  —  a  church  of  ease ; 
for  it  was  a  very  easy  mode  of  worship, 
discipline,  and  doctrine  that  was  there  prac 
tised  and  inculcated.  I  should  say  —  not 
intending  irreverence  —  that  Mr.  Morphine 
Velvet's  yoke  was  very  easy,  his  burden 
very  light.  There  was  a  sort  of  soothing, 
winning  elegance  and  tenderness  in  the 
tone  and  manner  in  which  he  prayed  and 
besought  his  dearly  beloved  brethren,  as 
many  as  are  here  present,  to  accompany 
him,  their  bland  and  graceful  pastor,  to  the 
throne  of  heavenly  grace.  Fit  leader  was 
he  of  such  a  flock  !  In  the  pulpit  he  was 
calm  and  fluent.  He  took  care  that  there 
should  be  nothing  in  his  sermons  to  arrest 
the  understanding  or  unprofitably  occupy 
it,  addressing  himself  entirely  to  the  feel- 


100         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ings  and  fancy  of  his  cultivated  audience, 
in  frequently  interesting  and  even  charm 
ingly  imaginative  compositions.  Such  a 
sermon  I  heard  to-night.  The  text  was 
a  fearful  passage  of  Scripture,  —  2  Corin 
thians  iv.  3  :  "  But  if  our  gospel  be  hid, 
it  is  hid  to  them  that  are  lost."  If  any 
words  were  calculated  to  startle  such  a 
congregation  out  of  their  guilty  and  fatal 
apathy,  were  not  these?  Ought  not  the 
minister  to  have  looked  around  him  and 
trembled?  So  one  would  have  thought; 
but  this  "  dear  man "  knew  his  mission 
and  flock  better. 

He  presented  us  an  elegant  description 
of  heaven,  with  its  crystal  battlements,  its 
jasper  walls,  its  buildings  of  pure  gold,  its 
foundations  of  precious  stones,  its  balmy 
air,  its  sounds  of  mysterious  melody,  its 
overflowing  fulness  of  everlasting  happiness. 
And  would  his  dear  hearers  be  content 
to  lose  all  this?  Content  to  enjoy  the 
pleasures  of  sin  for  a  season?  Forbid  it, 
eternal  Mercy  !  But  lest  a  strain  like  this 
should  disturb  or  distress  his  fastidious 


AFTER  CHURCH.  IOI 

hearers,  he  took  the  opportunity  to  en 
force  and  illustrate  the  consolatory  truth 
that  — 

"  Religion  never  was  designed 
To  make  our  pleasures  less." 

He  finally  sent  his  congregation  away  over 
flowing  with  Christian  sympathy,  very  well 
pleased  with  the  minister,  but  infinitely  bet 
ter  pleased  with  themselves. 

To  know  whether  a  minister,  young  or 
still  in  flower,  is  in  safe  or  dangerous 
paths,  there  are  two  psychometers,  a 
comparison  of  which  will  give  infallible 
returns. 

The  first  is  the  black  broadcloth  forming 
the  knees  of  his  pantaloons ;  the  second  the 
patch  of  carpet  before  his  mirror.  If  the 
first  is  unworn  and  the  second  frayed  and 
threadbare,  —  pray  for  him.  If  the  first  is 
worn  and  shiny,  and  the  second  keeps  its 
pattern  and  texture,  —  get  him  to  pray  for 
you. 

Thoughts  of  these  ministers  and  their 
countless  imitators  make  one  exclaim  with 


102         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

Romola,  "  God's  kingdom  is  something 
wider;  else  let  me  stand  outside  it,  with 
the  beings  I  love." 

These,  however,  are  exceptions,  with 
whom  we  like  to  contrast  ourselves.  Our 
own  weakness  and  misdemeanors  are  not 
so  apparent.  We  appear  better  and 
grander.  But  we  hesitate  in  drawing  near 
the  procession  of  holy  men  who  live  lives 
of  purity  and  self-denial.  I  wonder  if  it 
was  ever  easy  for  any  one  to  be  good? 
Being  good,  it  seems  to  me,  is  as  much  a 
v  matter  of  temperament  as  being  happy/' 
There  are  people  with  strong  capacity  for 
enjoyment  and  the  corresponding  power 
for  suffering;  and  there  are  people  of  a 
stolid,  phlegmatic  nature,  feeling  neither  joy 
nor  sorrow  very  keenly,  feeling  no  decided 
inclination  to  be  anything  but  good  and 
commonplace.  They  do  not  eat  their 
hearts  out  with  intense  anticipations,  or 
exhaust  themselves  with  devouring  posses 
sion,  but  take  things  placidly  as  they  come. 
They  never  feel  their  hearts  ache  with  the 
"  VVeltschmerz  "  which  Goethe  tells  of  in 


AFTER  CHURCH.  103 

such  comprehensive  words,  —  that  world- 
weariness  for  which  he  tried  every  cure,  yet 
which  cursed  so  large  a  part  of  his  life. 
Some  men,  then,  are  trying  one  way  to  be 
good,  some  another,  —  one  in  a  calm 
methodical  way,  with  no  expense  of  heart's 
blood ;  while  another  is  fighting  and  strug 
gling  and  straining  against  temptations  that 
hourly  beset  him. 

Have  we  any  right  to  condemn  when  we 
remember  that  the  germs  of  all  things  are 
in  the  human  heart;  that  the  greatest 
heroes  and  the  greatest  criminals  are  but 
different  modes  of  ourselves  ?  It  is  proba 
bly  a  truer  truth  than  most  of  us  realize, 
that  our  own  virtue  is  largely  a  matter  of 
circumstance;  that  our  good  conduct  is 
the  product  of  forces  outside  of  ourselves ; 
that  we  are  mainly  the  creatures  of  circum 
stance,  including  in  that  term  hereditary 
predispositions,  social  environments,  and  all 
other  things  that  influence  conduct  and 
character. 

Do  you  remember  "  Old  Titbottom's  " 
magic  spectacles,  through  which  he  could 


104         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

read  the  hearts  of  all  men,  and  which  he 
sometimes  regarded  as  a  gift  of  the  great 
est  value,  and  at  times  as  something  he  had 
been  happier  never  to  have  possessed  ? 

I  borrowed  those  spectacles  once ;  but 
the  visions  made  me  afraid.  If  I  felt 
myself  warmly  drawn  to  any  one,  I  struggled 
with  the  fierce  desire  of  seeing  him  through 
the  spectacles;  for  I  feared  to  find  him 
something  else  than  I  fancied.  But,  some 
times  mastered  after  long  struggles,  as  if  the 
unavoidable  condition  of  owning  the  spec 
tacles  were  using  them,  I  would  seize  them, 
and  saunter  forth. 

In  many  houses  I  thought  to  see  angels, 
nymphs,  or  at  least  women,  and  found  only 
broomsticks,  mops,  or  kettles  hurrying 
about,,  rattling  and  tinkling  in  a  state  of 
shrill  activity.  I  made  calls  upon  elegant 
ladies ;  and  after  I  had  enjoyed  the  gloss 
of  silk,  the  delicacy  of  laces,  and  the  glit 
ter  of  jewels,  I  slipped  on  my  spectacles, 
and  saw  a  peacock's  feather,  flounced,  fur- 
belowed,  and  fluttering,  or  an  iron  rod, 
thin,  sharp,  and  hard ;  nor  could  I  pos- 


AFTER  CHURCH.  105 

sibly  mistake  the  movement  of  the  drapery 
for  any  flexibility  of  the  thing  draped.  Or, 
mysteriously  chilled,  I  saw  a  statue  of  per 
fect  form  or  flowing  movement,  it  might 
be  alabaster,  or  bronze,  or  marble ;  but 
sadly  often  it  was  ice.  But  the  true  sad 
ness  was  rather  in  seeing  those  who,  not 
having  the  spectacles,  thought  that  the 
iron  rod  was  flexible,  and  the  ice  statue 
warm.  I  saw  many  a  gallant  heart,  which 
seemed  to  me  brave  and  loyal  as  the 
Crusaders,  pursuing  through  a  long  life  of 
devotion  the  hope  of  lighting  at  least  a 
smile  in  the  cold  eyes,  if  not  a  fire  in  the 
icy  heart.  I  watched  the  earnest,  enthu 
siastic  sacrifice.  I  saw  the  pure  resolve, 
the  generous  faith,  the  fine  scorn  of  doubt, 
the  impatience  of  suspicion.  I  watched  the 
grace,  the  ardor,  the  glory  of  devotion. 
Through  these  strange  spectacles  how  often 
I  saw  the  noblest  heart  renouncing  all 
other  hopes,  all  other  ambition,  all  other 
life,  than  the  possible  love  of  one  of  these 
statues. 

I  wept  until  my  spectacles  were  dimmed 


106         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

for  those  hopeless  lovers ;  but  there  was  a 
pang  beyond  tears  for  the  icy  statues.  I 
grew  old  and  hard,  almost  morose  ;  people 
seemed  to  me  so  blind  and  unreasonable. 
They  did  the  wrong  thing;  they  called 
green  yellow  and  black  white.  Young  men 
said  of  a  girl,  "  What  a  lovely,  simple 
creature  !  "  I  looked  through  my  glasses, 
and  there  was  only  a  glistening  wisp  of 
straw,  dry  and  hollow.  Or  they  said, 
"  What  a  cold,  proud  beauty  !  "  I  looked, 
and  lo,  —  a  Madonna,  whose  heart  held 
the  world.  Or  they  said,  "  What  a  wild, 
giddy  girl !  "  and  I  saw  a  glancing,  dancing 
mountain  stream,  pure  as  the  virgin  snow 
whence  it  flowed,  singing  through  sun  and 
shade,  over  pearls  and  gold-dust,  touching 
the  flowers  with  a  dewy  kiss,  —  a  beam  of 
grace,  a  happy  song,  a  line  of  light  in  the 
dim  and  troubled  landscape.  They  went 
to  see  actors  upon  the  stage.  I  went 
to  see  actors  in  the  boxes,  so  consum 
mately  cunning  that  others  did  not  know 
they  were  acting ;  and  they  did  not  suspect 
it  themselves. 


AFTER  CHURCH.  107 

But  I  could  not  grow  misanthropic  when 
I  saw  in  the  eyes  of  so  many  who  were 
called  old  the  gushing  fountains  of  eternal 
youth  and  the  light  of  an  immortal  dawn ; 
or  when  I  saw  those  who  were  deemed 
unsuccessful  or  aimless,  ruling  a  fair  realm 
of  peace  and  plenty,  either  in  their  own 
hearts  or  in  others',  —  a  realm  and  princely 
possession,  for  which  they  had  well  re 
nounced  a  hopeless  search  and  a  belated 
triumph.  I  knew  one  man,  who  had  been 
for  years  a  by-word  for  having  sought  the 
philosopher's  stone.  But  I  looked  at  him 
with  the  spectacles  and  saw  a  satisfaction 
in  concentrated  energies,  and  a  tenacity 
arising  from  a  devotion  to  a  noble  dream, 
which  was  not  apparent  in  the  youths  who 
ridiculed  him,  or  in  the  clever  gentlemen 
who  cracked  their  jokes  at  his  expense  at  a 
gossiping  dinner. 

And  there  is  your  neighbor  over  the  way, 
who  passes  for  a  woman  who  has  failed  in 
her  career  because  she  is  an  old  maid. 
People  wag  solemn  heads  of  pity,  and  say 
that  she  made  so  great  a  mistake  in  not 


108        IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

marrying  the  famous  or  wealthy  man  who 
was  for  years  her  suitor.  It  is  clear  that 
no  orange-flowers  will  bloom  for  her.  The 
young  people  make  their  tender  romances 
about  her,  as  they  watch  her  and  think  of 
her  solitary  hours  of  bitter  regret  and  wast 
ing  longing,  never  to  be  satisfied.  When  I 
first  knew  her  I  shared  this  sympathy,  and 
pleased  my  imagination  with  fancying  her 
hard  struggle  with  the  conviction  that  she 
had  lost  all  that  made  life  beautiful.  But 
when,  one  day,  I  raised  my  glasses  and 
glanced  at  her,  I  did  not  see  the  old  maid 
whom  we  all  pitied  for  a  secret  sorrow,  but 
a  woman  whose  nature  was  a  tropic,  in 
which  the  sun  shone,  birds  sang,  and  flowers 
bloomed  forever.  There  were  no  regrets, 
no  doubts  or  half-wishes,  but  a  calm  sweet 
ness,  a  transparent  peace.  I  could  hear 
her  say  simply  and  quietly,  "  If  I  did  not 
love  him,  how  could  I  marry  him  ?  "  Could 
one  grow  misanthropic  in  the  face  of  such 
fidelity  and  dignity  and  simplicity  ?  Great 
excellences  lie  concealed  in  the  depths  of 
character  like  pearls  at  the  bottom  of  the 


AFTER  CHURCH.  109 

sea.    Under  the  laughing,  glancing  surface, 
how  little  they  are  suspected  ! 

Have  those  of  us  who  wear  not  the 
magic  spectacles  continually  any  right  to 
criticise  or  condemn?  Can  we  tell  aught 
of  the  wrong  resisted  ?  There  is  always  a 
deep  vein  of  sorrow  and  disappointment, 
of  shadow  and  drawback,  in  every  human 
life.  One  man  wrote  "Miserrimus"  on  his 
tomb,  and  there  are  many  who  would  not 
refuse  that  briefest,  saddest,  and  most  sig 
nificant  of  epitaphs.  If  we  could  only  see 
into  the  inner  lives  of  men,  we  should  find 
that  behind  all  the  lightsome  foreground  of 
pleasure  there  looms  up  perpetually  this 
background  of  darkness,  like  a  thunder 
cloud  which  rolls  over  the  city  at  evening 
and  makes  the  world  colorless.  How  long 
will  it  be  before  we  shall  learn  that  for 
every  wound  that  betrays  itself  to  the  sight 
by  a  scar,  there  are  a  thousand  mutilations 
that  cripple,  each  of  them,  one  or  more 
of  our  highest  faculties  ?  The  Saviour  fre 
quently  cautions  his  disciples  against  this 
hasty  judgment  of  others,  to  which  we  are 


110         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

all  so  much  inclined,  disposing  lightly  and 
flippantly  of  reputations  which  are  as  dear 
to  them  as  ours  to  ourselves.  What  if  the 
same  easy,  careless  mode  of  judgment  were 
turned  upon  us?  Nothing  in  all  the  wide 
world  of  human  wickedness  is  more  selfish 
or  cruel  than  this  mean  depreciation  of  our 
neighbors,  as  if  we  were  better  than  they. 
In  this  as  in  all  things,  in  word  or  deed, 
there  is  one  rule  to  be  followed,  "What 
soever  ye  would  that  men  should  do  unto 
you,  do  ye  even  so  to  them,"  —  a  rule  so 
simple  and  so  comprehensive  that  all  ages 
have  pronounced  it  the  Golden  Rule,  as 
summing  up  our  whole  duty  in  our  relations 
to  each  other. 

We  have  been  accustomed  to  be  told  that 
the  greatest  thing  in  the  religious  world  is 
faith.  For  centuries  it  has  been  the  key 
note  of  the  evangelical  religion.  Long  ago, 
I  decided  that  my  faith  was  not  to  be  tri 
fled  with.  It  may  be  weak,  and  doubtless 
shows  a  great  want  of  intellect  on  my  part, 
but  the  only  faith  I  have  any  faith  in  is  the 
blind,  unquestioning  faith  of  a  child,  and 
with  this  faith  I  dare  not  trifle. 


AFTER  CHURCH.  in 

Students  so  often  become  sceptical  from 
so  much  investigation  that  I  have  always 
abstained  from  the  reading  of  any  books 
that  would  weaken  the  faith  I  have.  The 
religions  of  the  East  have  been  very  allur 
ing,  with  their  fascinating  theories,  such  as 
cycles  and  cycles  of  soul-life,  ending  in  the 
attainment  of  all  knowledge,  but  I  have 
never  explored  them.  And  I  have  been 
able  to  preserve  unquestioning  faith  in 
"God,  the  Father  Almighty,  Maker  of 
Heaven  and  Earth,  and  in  Jesus  Christ,  his 
only  begotten  Son,"  a  hell  where  bad  peo 
ple  go,  and  a  heaven  peopled  with  good 
angels,  and  echo  in  my  heart  the  words  of 
Savonarola,  "Be  thankful,  my  daughter,  if 
your  own  soul  has  been  spared  perplexity, 
and  judge  not  those  to  whom  a  harder  lot 
has  been  given." 

I  can  never  forget  the  impression  made 
upon  me  by  a  clergyman,  who  took  me  into 
his  confidence,  with  one  of  those  strange 
confessions  which  are  sometimes  made  by 
the  most  reticent  to  the  most  unlikely  of 
listeners.  A  mutual  friend  mentioned  his 


112         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITA  TION. 

name  to  me  one  day,  as  we  stood  at  the 
hotel  door  together ;  he  merely  bowed,  and 
a  moment  later  moved  away,  and  I  did  not 
give  him  a  second  thought.  The  following 
afternoon,  in  one  of  my  long  rambles,  I 
found  myself  far  away  from  the  hotel,  and 
a  sudden  mountain  storm  came  up  before 
I  could  find  shelter  of  any  kind.  It  was 
not  only  an  unpleasant,  but  a  dangerous  posi 
tion,  and  I  confess  to  having  been  a  good 
deal  frightened.  As  I  looked  helplessly 
about,  the  sight  of  the  tall  priest  I  had  met 
there  the  day  before  was  a  very  welcome 
one.  He  was  at  least  a  human  being  and 
a  man,  and  might  know  of  some  hut  where 
we  could  find  temporary  safety.  As  it  hap 
pened,  he  did ;  and  for  more  than  an  hour 
we  were  together  in  an  empty  cabin  on  the 
hillside. 

The  storm  increased,  and  our  danger 
was  very  evident.  How  it  came  about  I 
do  not  know,  but  the  conversation  turned 
upon  fear,  trust  in  God,  and  faith.  Shall  I 
ever  forget  the  man's  haggard,  stricken  face, 
as  he  told  me  his  story  ?  —  told  me,  while 


AFTER  CHURCH.  113 

the  lightning  played  about  us  in  forked 
tongues  of  flame,  of  his  simple,  child-like, 
unquestioning  belief  in  God  and  Christ  and 
the  old-fashioned  devil  with  a  cloven  foot 
and  a  hell  of  fire  and  brimstone ;  how  he 
had  preached  plain  Bible  truths  such  as  he 
himself  had  learned  at  his  mother's  knee ; 
how  little  by  little  doubts  came,  question 
ings  arose,  faith  became  clouded ;  how  the 
wonderful  story  of  Christianity,  which  he 
had  reverently  received,  and  in  which  he 
had  reverently  instructed  others,  took  grad 
ually  but  surely  the  hues  of  a  lovely  fairy 
tale  which  man's  intellect  could  only  smile 
at,  not  seriously  accept;  how  the  trouble 
grew  greater,  and  books  and  study  only 
made  it  worse,  until,  in  order  to  remain  an 
honest  man,  he  had  fled  from  church  and 
people,  taking  his  nominal  holiday  for  a 
season,  knowing  well  in  his  heart  that  it 
was  a  farewell  for  all  time.  As  the  storm 
increased,  the  man's  excitement  grew.  I 
think  he  forgot  I  was  there,  and  talked  only 
to  himself  or  the  spirits  he  recognized  in 
the  storm  shrieks.  Oh,  it  was  awful,  the 
8 


114         IN  MAIDEN  M EDIT  A  TION. 

great  agony  of  a  soul  in  doubt !  Never 
can  I  forget  the  unutterable  horror  of  it,  — 
the  tortured  pain,  the  seething  agony,  the 
writhing  despair  of  that  human  soul.  It 
was  sport  for  devils,  rare  mirth  for  thb 
Arch-fiend  himself,  bored  with  the  puny 
impotence  of  man  in  fashioning  evil.  Rich, 
rare  sport  for  the  old  pagan  to  watch  a 
nineteenth-century  conscience  so  saturated 
with  intellectual  culture  that  it  had  thrown 
old  beliefs  to  the  wind,  and  denied  as  fables 
God  and  Satan  equally. 

To  be  doubted  must  convulse  the  Power 
of  Evil  with  devilish  delight;  and  I  can 
fancy  him  evolving  out  of  his  inner  con 
sciousness  a  rare  refinement  of  revenge  for 
the  presumption  of  this  clarified  intellect, 
even  while  the  anguished  soul  told  of  his 
doubts  and  of  the  peace  gone  from  him 
forever. 

The  storm  cleared  slightly,  and  the  light 
ning  ceased.  The  man  before  me  was  still 
looking  out  over  the  mountains  with  wide, 
unseeing  eyes,  unconscious  that  any  one 
was  near  him.  I  hated  to  leave  him  alone 


AFTER  CHURCH.  115 

with  his  great  agony,  yet  I  dreaded  more 
to  have  him  come  out  of  that  trance-like 
state  and  remember  that  he  had  spoken 
such  words  to  a  stranger. 

So  very  quietly  I  stole  away  and  left  him 
alone  with  his  tortured  soul.  Are  we  not 
all 

"As  infants  crying  in  the  night, 

As  infants  crying  for  a  light, 
And  with  no  language  but  a  cry  "  ? 

And  if  a  glimmer  of  light  has  come  to  me 
as  a  glorious  heritage,  I  shall  fan  it  gently, 
lest  I  be  left  in  total  darkness.  Wise  men 
do  not  encourage  the  habit  of  criticism,  the 
tendency  of  which  is  necessarily  sceptical. 
In  religion  lies  the  only  guidance  for  human 
life ;  and  a  man  should  reflect  that  although 
observances  may  seem  to  him  offensive, 
and  stories  told  about  the  gods  incredible, 
yet,  as  a  rule  of  action,  a  system  which  has 
been  the  growth  of  ages  is  infinitely  more 
precious  than  any  theory  he  can  think  out 
for  himself.  He  should  know  that  his  own 
mind,  that  the  mind  of  any  single  individual, 
is  unequal  to  so  vast  a  matter.  A  man  may 


Il6         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

think  as  he  likes  about  the  legends  of  Zeus 
and  Here,  but  he  must  keep  his  thoughts  to 
himself.  A  man  who  brings  into  contempt 
the  creed  of  his  country  is  the  deepest  of 
criminals,  and  deserves  death.  "  Let  him 
die  for  it,"  —  a  remarkable  expression  to 
have  been  used  by  Plato,  the  wisest  and 
gentlest  of  human  law-givers. 

A  woman's  need  of  religion  seems  to  me 
much  greater  than  a  man's,  not  only  for  the 
next  life,  but  for  this ;  not  only  to  gain 
heaven,  but  to  enable  her  to  exist  until  she 
reaches  it.  A  man  without  some  sort  of 
religion  is  at  best  a  poor  reprobate,  the 
foot-ball  of  destiny,  with  no  tie  linking  him 
to  infinity  and  the  wondrous  Eternity  that 
is  begun  with  him ;  but  a  woman  without 
it  is  even  worse,  —  a  flame  without  heat,  a 
rainbow  without  color,  a  flower  without  per 
fume.  A  man  may  in  some  sort  tie  his  frail 
hopes  and  honor  to  business  or  the  world ; 
but  a  woman  without  the  anchor,  Faith,  is 
adrift  and  a  wreck. 

A  man  may  craze  his  thought  and  his 
brain  to  trustfulness  in  such  poor  harborage 


AFTER  CHURCH.  117 

as  fame  and  reputation  may  stretch  before 
him ;  but  a  woman,  where  can  she  put  her 
hope  in  storms,  if  not  in  Heaven  ? 

And  that  trust,  that  abiding  love,  that 
enduring  hope  mellowing  every  page  and 
scene  of  life,  lighting  them  with  pleasant 
radiance  when  the  world-storms  break,  what 
can  bestow  it  all  but  a  holy  soul-tie  to  what 
is  above  the  storms  ?  Who  that  has  enjoyed 
the  counsel  and  love  of  a  Christian  mother 
but  will  echo  the  thought  with  energy  and 
hallow  it  with  a  tear? 

A  vision  comes  to  me  of  my  mother  as 
she  sat  one  Sunday  afternoon.  One  hand 
is  softly  stroking  the  hair  from  my  forehead, 
the  other  turning  the  leaves  of  a  book  as 
she  reads  in  her  low  sweet  voice  the  words 
of  Thomas  a  Kempis.  It  was  years  ago ; 
but  I  hear  the  words  now,  embracing,  as 
they  do,  the  whole  world  of  self-denial,  the 
spirit  of  self-sacrifice.  I  have  never  com 
prehended  them,  but  once  comprehended,  it 
seems  to  me  they  would  prove  the  essence, 
the  soul  of  Christianity :  — 

"  Forsake  thyself,  resign  thyself,  and  thou 


Il8         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

shalt  enjoy  much  inward  peace.  Then  shall 
all  vain  imaginations,  evil  perturbations,  and 
superfluous  cares  fly  away,  then  shall  im 
moderate  fear  leave  thee,  inordinate  love 
shall  die." 

It  was  a  little,  old-fashioned  book,  but  it 
works  miracles  to-day,  while  sermons  and 
treatises  newly  issued  leave  things  as  they 
were,  or  worse  than  before.  It  was  written 
by  a  hand  that  waited  for  the  heart's  prompt 
ing  ;  it  is  the  chronicle  of  a  solitary,  hidden 
anguish,  struggle,  trust,  and  triumph,  not 
written  on  velvet  cushions  to  teach  endur 
ance  to  those  who  are  treading  with  bleed 
ing  feet  on  the  stones.  And  it  will  remain 
to  all  time  a  lasting  record  of  human  needs 
and  human  consolations,  —  the  voice  of  a 
brother  who  years  ago  felt  and  suffered  and 
renounced,  in  the  cloister,  perhaps,  with 
serge  gown  and  tonsured  head,  with  chant 
ing  and  long  fasts,  and  in  a  fashion  of 
speech  different  from  ours,  but  under  the 
same  silent  far-off  heavens  and  with  the 
same  passionate  desires,  the  same  strivings, 
the  same  failures,  the  same  weariness. 


AFTER  CHURCH.  119 

Lately,  I  have  heard  women  arraigned 
in  a  most  startling  manner  for  their  want 
of  charity,  of  thoughtfulness,  of  loving-kind 
ness.  Having  come  into  the  arena,  men 
no  longer  consider  it  necessary  to  "  handle 
them  with  gloves,"  but  boldly  criticise  and 
condemn. 

In  the  table  of  contents  of  a  well-known 
magazine,  my  eye  caught  the  title,  "The 
Mannerless  Sex."  The  writer  scathingly 
denounced  the  code  of  manners  followed 
in  public  by  the  so-called  "gentle  sex"  as 
disgracefully  inconsiderate,  superlatively 
selfish,  and  exasperatingly  insolent.  He 
railed  of  their  manner  in  a  horse-car.  He 
ruthlessly  condemned  the  inconsiderate 
woman  in  a  sleeping-car,  who  arises  while 
it  is  yet  night,  and,  secreting  herself  in  the 
dressing-room,  locks  the  door  against  all 
other  women,  and  refuses  to  be  dislodged 
by  threats  or  prayers.  But  it  is  when  lovely 
woman  goes  a-shopping  she  receives  the 
most  severe  criticism.  He  said,  in  fact, 
that  she  does  very  little  that  she  ought  to 


120         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

do,  and  very,  very  much  that  she  ought  not 
to  do. 

Who  has  not  suffered  from  the  waspish 
tongue  of  an  inconsiderate  woman?  For 
how  much  misery  must  it  answer?  The 
wounded  pride,  the  lacerated  feelings,  the 
tarnished  reputations  she  leaves  in  her 
wake !  A  few  hasty,  careless  words,  a 
brutal  attack,  a  refined  stab,  as  the  case 
may  be,  and  some  one's  life  is  not  the 
same.  Thank  God,  there  are  few  such 
women !  But  rare  as  they  are,  they  have 
the  power  to  reflect  sadly  and  endlessly 
upon  the  world  of  womankind.  If  each 
woman  could  only  realize  her  own  power 
for  the  weal  or  woe  of  the  world !  Each 
woman  is  a  queen.  Consciously  or  not, 
she  is  in  many  a  heart  enthroned.  Queens 
they  must  ever  be,  —  queens  to  their  lovers, 
queens  to  their  husbands  and  sons,  queens 
of  higher  mystery  to  the  world  beyond, 
which  bows  itself  and  will  forever  bow  be 
fore  the  myrtle  crown  and  stainless  sceptre 
of  womanhood. 

A  most  universal  and  most  unlovely  trait 


AFTER  CHURCH.  121 

in  woman's  character  is  the  little  sympathy 
they  have  for  each  other  in  weakness  or 
sin.  Can  it  be  true  there  is  a  savage  in 
stinct  of  cruelty  innate  in  women,  not  only 
the  lack  of  the  partisanship  of  the  sex,  but 
a  real  distrust  and  disbelief  in  each  other, 
a  feline  wish  to  rend  and  tear?  Who  does 
not  remember  the  scene  in  "The  Scarlet 
Letter  "  where  Hester  Prynne,  led  forth  to 
her  ignominious  punishment,  finds  her  worst 
tortures  in  the  grim,  upright,  and  unfeeling 
Puritan  dames,  who  treated  her  to  cold, 
unpitying  glances  and  jeers? 

The  same  spirit  modified  has  exhibited 
itself  in  each  succeeding  age,  and  one  sadly 
recalls  that  throughout  history  women  have 
been  tenfold  more  pitiless  and  unrelenting 
to  women  than  have  men.  Yet  women 
daily  pray  to  be  delivered  from  "envy, 
hatred,  malice,  and  all  uncharitableness," 
and  possess  in  the  highest  degree  the  re 
ligion  of  the  ermines  and  of  refinement, 
the  horror  of  a  speck  or  stain.  v  The  one 
thing,  it  seems  to  me,  that  a  woman  owes 
to  the  world,  to  herself,  and  to  her  Maker, 


122         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

is  reverence  for  her  own  sex.  Pay  homage 
to  womankind,  adorn  it,  place  sacrifices 
upon  its  altars,  rejoice  in  unceasing  service 
to  it,  for  surely  there  is  nothing  more  beau 
tiful,  more  holy,  than  womanliness. 

There  is  a  courtesy  of  the  heart :  it  is 
akin  to  love,  and  out  of  it  arises  the  purest 
courtesy  in  the  outward  behavior. 

And  is  it  not  by  Love  we  expect  to  be 
saved  ?  —  Love,  which  is  the  high-priest 
of  the  world,  the  revealer  of  Immortality, 
the  fire  of  the  altar,  and  without  whose 
ray  we  could  hot  even  dimly  comprehend 
Eternity. 

Saint  Paul  says,  "If  I  speak  with  the 
tongues  of  men  and  of  angels,  but  have  not 
Love,  I  am  become  sounding  brass  or 
a  clanging  cymbal."  Christ  himself  says 
that  Love  is  a  fulfilling  of  the  law.  Love 
suffereth  long,  and  is  kind.  Love  envieth 
not.  Love  vaunteth  not  itself,  is  not  puffed 
up,  doth  not  behave  itself  unseemly,  seeketh 
not  its  own,  is  not  provoked,  taketh  no 
account  of  evil. 

And  the  final  test  will  be  not  religious- 


AFTER  CHURCH.  123 

ness,  but  Love :  not  what  we  have  done, 
not  what  we  have  believed,  not  what  we 
have  achieved,  but  how  we  have  loved, 
according  to  the  number  of  cups  of  cold 
water  we  have  given  in  the  name  of  Christ. 


AFTER  A  WEDDING. 


AFTER  A  WEDDING. 

"  That  which  issues  from  the  heart  alone 
Will  bend  the  hearts  of  others  to  your  own." 

"  TAEARLY  beloved,  we  are  gathered 
-1— '  together  here  in  the  sight  of  God, 
and  in  the  face  of  this  company,  to  join 
together  this  man  and  this  woman  in  holy 
matrimony." 

A  hush  has  fallen  upon  the  expectant 
multitude.  The  bride  has  come ;  and  every 
eye  is  turned  upon  her  as,  with  her  beauty 
shadowed  in  white  veils,  she  stands  with 
her  court,  with  her  blushes  and  smiles,  the 
glisten  of  her  white  robes,  the  glimmer  of 
her  lace,  the  prominent  feature  of  a  lovely 
pageant. 

"For  better,  for  worse,  for  richer,  for 
poorer,  till  death  us  do  part !  "  How  few 
of  us  realize  the  solemnity,  the  sweet  awful- 
ness  of  the  scene  ! 


128         IN  MAIDEN  M EDIT  A  TION 

Does  the  young  bride  among  her  cloud 
of    maidens   realize   it   herself?     Are   her 
thoughts   with   the  great   mystery  that   is 
about  to  absorb  her  life  into  another's,  or 
do  the  weighty  matters  of  her  parapher 
nalia,  of  her  wedding  gifts,  her  train,  the 
church  processional,  exclude  perception  of 
the  way  into  that  new  sphere  just  closing 
around   her,  in   which   she  shall  walk  to 
all  outside  view  the  same,  but  in  reality 
another  being?     Let  us  hope  that  she  at 
least,  of  all  this  vast  throng,  understands 
something   of  the  great   miracle.     It  can 
only  be,  then,  with  the  reverence  due  to 
some  mystery  of  old,  where  one  draws  near 
to  the  holy  of  holies,  that  the  bride  ap 
proaches  the  altar,  —  an  altar  that  burns  to 
heaven  with  the  white  flame  of  all   pure 
love  and  devotion,  or  an  altar  on  which 
is  to  be  offered  the  mournful  sacrifice  of 
broken  hearts  and   lives.     Full  often  the 
consciousness  of  this  betrays  itself  by  the 
trembling  tones  in  the  voice  that  invokes 
invisible  powers  to  witness  the  bridal,  and 
the  realization  of  it  is  so  appalling  that  all 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  129 

the  nervous  strength  is  summoned  to  carry 
off  the  hour  triumphantly,  and  hide  emo 
tion  from  the  curious  crowd  that  custom 
calls  to  witness  the  solemn  acts  of  our  lives, 
the  bridal  and  funeral  rites,  the  two  mo 
ments  when  feeling  is  most  intense,  and 
should  be  most  sacred  and  unseen. 

The  bride  was  wondrous  fair  to-night, 
and  we  can  only  hope  that  the  tremor  of 
her  voice,  the  earnest  look  in  her  lovely 
eyes,  evinced  that  in  her  soul  there  was  an 
altar  where  sacrificial  fire  is  ever  burning, 
that  she  whispered  as  an  oath,  "  Set  me  as 
a  seal  upon  thine  heart,  as  a  seal  upon 
thine  arm,  for  love  is  strong  as  death,  and 
jealousy  as  cruel  as  the  grave."  C  Of  all 
passions  that  can  take  possession  of  the 
heart  or  brain,  jealousy  is  the  worst.)  For 
many  generations  the  chemists  sought  for 
the  secret  by  which  all  metals  could  be 
changed  to  gold,  and  through  which  the 
basest  could  become  the  best.  Jealousy 
seeks  exactly  the  opposite.  It  endeavors 
to  transmute  the  very  gold  of  love  into  the 
dross  of  shame  and  crime.  Does  she  know 
9 


130         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

this,  and  swear  self-abnegation?  Does  she 
give  thanks  for  the  strength  and  fire  and 
tenderness  in  him,  —  thanks  that  so  great  a 
fate  has  been  given  her,  as  entering  into 
the  circle  of  his  days?  Does  she  feel 
that  neither  teasing  trouble  nor  want,  nor 
pain,  nor  weariness,  sharp  thrusts  nor  heavy 
blows,  shall  signify  to  her;  that  she  will 
defy  death  and  fate  itself,  and  love  shall 
be  eternal? 

If  one  desires  to  investigate  how  the 
groom  thinks  and  feels,  while  passing 
through  such  an  ordeal,  I  refer  him  to 
Rudyard  Kipling's  "  Story  of  the  Gadsbys," 
in  which  he  pictures  in  detail  Captain 
Gadsby's  misery  from  the  moment  when 
his  friend  begged  him  "for  the  Honor  of 
the  Regiment,  stand  up  "  to  the  time  when, 
having  been  Mendelssohned  out  of  church 
to  the  paternal  roof,  they  are  enduring  the 
usual  tortures  over  the  wedding-cake. 

Ah,  what  a  prize  a  man  gets  who  wins 
a  bride  so  beautiful !  How  the  men  envy 
him  who  come  to  the  wedding  and  see  her 
hanging  on  his  arm,  in  all  her  wealth  of 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  131 

tulle  and  orange  blossoms.  The  dear, 
young,  round,  soft  thing  !  Her  heart  must 
be  just  as  soft,  her  temper  just  as  free 
from  angles,  her  character  just  as  pliant. 
If  anything  ever  goes  wrong  there,  it  must 
be  the  husband's  fault ;  he  can  make  her 
what  he  likes,  that  is  plain.  And  the  lover 
himself  thinks  so,  too ;  the  little  darling  is 
so  fond  of  him,  her  little  vanities  are  so 
bewitching,  he  wouldn't  consent  to  her 
being  a  bit  wiser  for  the  world.  Every 
man  under  such  circumstances  is  conscious 
of  being  a  great  physiognomist.  Nature 
has  written  out  his  bride's  character  for 
him  in  those  exquisite  lines  of  cheek  and 
lip  and  chin,  in  those  eyelids  delicate  as 
petals,  in  the  dark  liquid  depths  of  those 
wonderful  eyes.  How  she  will  dote  on  her 
children !  She  is  almost  a  child  herself, 
and  the  little  pink  round  things  will  hang 
around  her  like  the  flowerets  round  the 
central  flower,  and  the  husband  will  look 
on  smiling  benignly,  able  whenever  he 
chooses  to  withdraw  into  the  sanctuary  of 
his  wisdom,  toward  which  his  sweet  wife 


132         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

will  look  reverently  and  never  lift  the  cur 
tain.  It  is  a  marriage  such  as  they  made 
in  the  Golden  Age,  when  the  men  were 
all  wise  and  majestic,  the  women  all  lovely 
and  loving.  Of  course  it  is  extremely  un 
becoming  in  a  sensible  man  to  fall  in  love 
with  a  girl  who  has  nothing  more  than  her 
beauty  to  recommend  her.  I  know  that, 
as  a  rule,  sensible  men  fall  in  love  with  the 
most  sensible  women  of  their  acquaintance, 
see  through  all  the  petty  deceits  of  coquet 
tish  vanity,  never  imagine  themselves  loved 
when  they  are  not  loved,  cease  loving  on 
all  proper  occasions,  and  marry  the  woman 
most  fitted  for  them  in  every  respect  in 
deed,  so  as  to  compel  the  approbation  of 
all  the  maiden  ladies  in  the  neighborhood. 
But  in  so  complex  a  thing  as  human  nature 
we  must  consider  that  it  is  hard  to  find 
rules  without  exceptions. 

It  occurs  to  me  that  as  people  when 
they  marry  virtually  renounce  other  com 
panionship  and  friends,  they  might  perhaps 
do  wisely  before  the  knot  is  tied  to  ascer 
tain  whether  the  intellectual  dowry  of  the 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  133 

other  is  sufficient  for  the  demands  that  will 
be  made  upon  it  for  sympathy  and  enter 
tainment.  Men  choose  their  wives  because 
they  are  pretty,  or  because  they  are  rich, 
or  because  they  are  well  connected,  but 
rarely  for  the  permanent  interest  of  their 
society. 

Yet  who  that  has  ever  been  compelled 
to  the  dreadful  misfortune  of  a  tete-a-tete 
with  an  uncompanionable  person  could  re 
flect  without  apprehension  upon  a  lifetime 
of  such  tete-a-tetes  ? 

What  is  the  use  of  having  any  mental 
superiority,  if  in  a  matter  so  enormously 
important  as  the  choice  of  a  companion 
for  life  it  fails  to  give  warning  when  the 
choice  is  absurdly  unsuitable?  Have  you 
never  noticed,  though,  that  gifted  women 
are  most  apt  to  throw  themselves  away  on 
men  entirely  unworthy  of  them,  led  captive 
by  their  own  ideals,  making  gods  of  stocks 
and  stones  ?  When  men  complain,  as  they 
do  not  infrequently,  that  their  wives  have 
no  ideas,  the  question  inevitably  suggests 
itself  to  me,  why  the  superiority  of  the 


134          M  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

masculine  intellect  did  not  permit  it  to 
discern  the  defect  in  time.  If  they  are  so 
clever  as  to  be  bored  by  ordinary  women, 
why  were  they  unable  to  find  the  feminine 
cleverness  that  would  respond  to  it?  The 
world,  from  past  experience,  does  not  expect 
a  man  of  genius  to  marry  rightly,  and  half 
includes  a  blunder  in  matrimony  among 
the  evidences  of  genius. 

Of  all  men  who  ever  lived  Shelley  was, 
perhaps,  the  best  representative  of  genius 
pure  and  simple,  possessing  it  in  the  high 
est  degree.  Those  who  read  of  Shelley  and 
his  marriage  somehow  feel  that  it  was  in 
him  to  make  precisely  the  blunder  which, 
without  indorsing  the  modern  libels  on 
Harriet  Westbrook,  one  feels  assured  that 
he  did  make.  And  what  profound  disap 
pointment,  what  failure,  what  dismay,  comes 
to  the  mind  with  the  name  of  Mary  Shel 
ley  !  All  that  is  highest  and  best  in  mental 
aspiration,  all  that  is  lowest  and  most  dis 
appointing  in  actual  experience.  If  any 
two  people  could  have  been  joined  together 
other  than  God's  Word  doth  allow,  and 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  135 

have  lived  honorably  in  the  eyes  of  men 
and  before  the  tribunal  of  their  own  hearts, 
one  would  say  it  would  have  been  the  pure 
spirit  of  Mary  Godwin  and  the  unworldly 
soul  of  Percy  Bysshe  Shelley.  Intellectual 
companionship,  a  true  affection,  freedom 
from  the  trammels  of  worldliness,  might 
have  secured  them  an  ideal  union  for  all 
time.  But  what  does  one  see?  The  first 
sorrow  comes,  the  death  of  the  little  child 
at  Rome,  and  then  the  sweet  bells  jangle, 
dissatisfaction,  weariness,  the  sundering  of 
real  companionship,  a  noxious  social  atmos 
phere,  probable  infidelity,  and  the  end. 
However,  observers  may  experience  any 
emotion  at  the  blunders  of  genius, — in 
dignation,  regret,  scorn,  or  even  a  certain 
pleasure  at  finding  the  demigods  so  like 
men,  —  but  they  are  never  surprised.  But 
genius  is  incomprehensible;  all  we  know 
of  it  is,  that  it  is  neither  a  cause  nor  a 
consequence  of  the  possession  of  judgment. 
.  .  .  But  why  able,  sensible,  practical  men 
make  such  blunders  is  a  source  of  constant 
amazement.  The  common  notion  that  they 


136         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

are  carried  away  by  passion  may  be  true 
sometimes ;  but  that  does  not  explain  why 
passion  —  men's  field  of  choice  being  so 
wide  —  does  not  fix  itself  upon  the  right 
person. 

Some  say  it  may  be  all  summed  up  in 
the  one  word  "  attraction."  Is  it  not  odd, 
then,  that  the  gifted  in  selecting  the  one 
friend  from  the  world  commit  such  fatal 
errors,  yet  in  choosing  their  other  friends 
display  rare  judgment? 

I  frequently  see  a  woman  married  to  the 
man  of  all  others  the  least  suited  to  her, 
yet  gather  a  circle  of  friends  around  her, 
whose  excellence  and  charm  does  but  in 
crease  her  trouble  by  rendering  it  more 
conscious;  and  men  do  the  same  thing, 
though  it  is  less  perceived. 

There  must  be  something  that  clouds 
the  judgment,  and  that  something,  I  fancy, 
is  one  of  two  things,  —  either  unreasoning, 
almost  preposterous  self-confidence,  which 
makes  a  man  quite  sure  that  if  a  woman 
impresses  him  pleasantly  he  must  therefore 
understand  her ;  and  the  other  is  the  action 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  137 

of  caprice,  that  mental  impulse  which  is 
independent  of  reason,  and  which  in  both 
sexes  seems  to  operate  more  strongly  in 
choosing  a  companion  for  life  than  on  any 
other  occasion.  A  man  who  likes  a  woman 
and  a  woman  who  is  in  love  with  a  man 
always  believe  that  each  knows  all  about 
the  other,  resent  advice  from  the  outside, 
and  will  not  even  consider  circumstantial 
evidence,  patent  to  all  but  themselves. 
There  is  an  inner  vanity  in  men  and 
women  as  to  their  own  judgment,  and 
when  a  helpmate  is  to  be  chosen,  it  seems 
to  wake  in  irresistible  strength. 

Marriage  is  still  an  unsettled  problem. 
The  Eastern  poets  sing  woman  a  slave ;  the 
Western,  man  enslaved  by  her.  But  far- 
sighted  spirits,  like  Dante,  reject  both  views, 
and  sing  Ideal  Love,  —  a  thought  too 
precious  for  humanity  to  let  it  escape  when 
once  it  reaches  human  consciousness.  Yet 
it  is  philosophers  and  moralists  whom  Time 
leads  to  accept  it;  while  the  poets,  its 
first  leaders,  ignore  the  truth  that  marriage 
involves  human  dignity,  responsibility,  com 
munity,  and  mutual  trust. 


138          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

To  making  this  truth  clear,  the  "  Woman's 
Poet "  has  devoted  his  poet's  gift ;  and  no 
sooner  does  he  do  so  than  we  see  how 
little  woman's  voice  has  been  heard  in 
other  poetry ;  and  we  can  but  feel  thank 
ful  that  a  singer,  who  can  make  himself 
gladly  heard,  is  singing  of  freedom,  open 
ness,  pure  and  conscious  devotion,  con 
science  responsible  to  itself  alike  in  man 
and  woman. 

On  his  plain  but  trusty  sword  are  these 
words  only,  —  Love  and  Understand.  The 
union  between  two  people  is  only  true, 
according  as  they  love  and  understand  each 
other  in  thought,  feeling,  and  will,  and  are 
consequently  able  to  fight  life's  battles, 
bear  its  pains,  and  enjoy  its  glory  together, 
and  this  by  having  directed  forward  and 
freed  each  other's  development. 

How  often,  when  all  is  falling  to  pieces, 
do  two  people  by  a  sudden  flash  see  how 
they  have  been  gradually  bringing  their  fate 
on  themselves,  so  that  it  destroys  all  the 
edifice  of  their  past  life,  —  the  man  by  not 
having  considered  the  woman's  personality ; 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  139 

the  woman,  by  having  loved  a  person  who 
does  not  exist. 

An  eminent  historian,  now  a  dignitary  of 
the  Church  of  England,  was  once  asked, 
"  What  is  the  moral  attitude  of  men  to 
ward  women?"  After  a  few  moments' 
consideration,  with  a  humorous  twinkle  of 
his  eye,  came  the  unexpected  reply, 
"  They  have  none."  Is  it  not  true  ?  Men 
have  no  really  definite  standard  by  which 
they  regulate  their  conduct  toward  women, 
such  as  they  have  in  their  dealings  with 
their  fellow-men.  A  lie  told  to  a  woman 
is  hardly  a  moral  offence.  A  promise 
made  to  a  woman  is  only  optionally  bind 
ing.  The  moment  a  man  finds  or  feels 
there  is  a  woman  in  the  case,  his  moral 
sense  of  fairness  and  justice  seems  to  desert 
him.  If  she  be  young  and  fair,  he  places 
her  on  a  pedestal  and  worships  her  like 
a  goddess,  doing  her  behest  for  right  or 
wrong.  After  a  while  he  wearies  of  his 
worship,  and  rudely  shakes  the  frail  ped 
estal  of  his  goddess.  Down  comes  his 
idol,  and  falls  to  pieces  before  his  eyes. 


140         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

Then  the  quondam  worshipper  scornfully 
exclaims,  "  Why  did  n't  she  live  up  to  my 
ideal?  She's  only  a  woman  after  all;" 
and  the  fallen  idol  gets  afterwards  less  than 
justice.^  It  is  not  priests  or  pessimists  who 
advance  this  idea ;  but  keen-sighted  ob 
servers  of  the  every- day  lives  of  men  and 
women  are  of  the  opinion  that,  if  the  stern 
hand  of  law  were  relaxed,  no  sense  of 
honor  or  justice  would  bind  men  to  women 
after  the  outward  sensual  attraction  was 
gone  or  diminished.  Sadly  often  they  are 
correct  in  believing  that  honor  and  justice 
seldom  enter  into  account  in  connection 
with  a  woman;  and  in  the  lives  of  most 
women  it  is  only  credulity,  the  continued 
trust  in  man,  which  is  the  alternative  of 
despair.  This  is  due,  in  a  measure,  to 
that  hateful  view  of  life  which  most  men 
hold,  that  reduces  woman  to  a  mere  thing, 
—  the  dearest  thing,  perhaps,  in  all  the 
world,  but  not  a  human  being,  not  his 
peer.  They  believe  they  really  love  their 
wives,  and  at  the  same  time  think  they 
can  be  Will  and  Conscience  for  them.  It 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  141 

is  a  view  that  makes  it  possible  for  a 
woman  to  call  these  habits  of  thought  in 
men  chivalry,  and  exercise  every  quality  of 
her  inner  and  outward  being  only  to  secure 
the  small  triumphs  of  an  odalisque.  Yet 
can  she  believe  herself  a  pure-hearted 
woman,  —  believe  that  she  loves ;  believe 
that  she  really  lives? 

There  may  be  degrees  of  conjugal  felicity, 
satisfactory  in  their  way,  without  intellec 
tual  intercourse ;  and  yet  I  cannot  think 
any  one  of  high  culture  could  regard  his  or 
her  marriage  as  altogether  a  successful  one 
so  long  as  either  is  shut  out  from  the 
mental  life  of  the  other.  No  love  is  likely 
to  last  that  is  not  based  on  intellectual 
sympathy.  When  the  mind  is  interested  and 
contented,  it  does  not  tire  half  as  fast  as 
the  eyes  or  the  passions.  In  any  very  great 
love  there  is  at  the  commencement  a  de 
lightful  sense  of  meeting  something  long 
sought,  some  supplement  of  ourselves  long 
desired  in  vain.  When  this  pleasure  is 
based  on  the  charm  of  some  mind  wholly 
akin  to  our  own,  and  filled  for  us  with  ever- 


142          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

renewing  well-springs  of  the  intellect,  there 
is  really  hardly  any  reason  why  this  mu 
tual  delight  should  ever  change.  I  have 
often  wondered  if  it  were  possible  that 
two  people  should  live  together,  and  talk 
to  each  other  every  day  for  twenty  years, 
without  knowing  each  other's  views  too 
well  for  them  to  seem  worth  expressing 
or  worth  listening  to.  There  are  friends 
whom  we  know  too  well,  so  that  our  talk 
with  them  has  less  of  refreshment  and  en 
tertainment  than  a  conversation  with  any 
intelligent  stranger.  There  seems  to  me 
danger  of  this  in  marriage,  which  may  be 
come  dull,  not  because  the  mental  force  of 
either  has  declined,  but  because  each  has 
come  to  know  so  accurately  beforehand 
what  the  other  will  say  on  any  given  topic 
that  inquiry  is  felt  to  be  useless.  To  keep 
herself,  then,  from  growing  uninteresting,  a 
woman  should  take  as  much  trouble  at  least 
to  renew  her  mind  by  fresh  knowledge  and 
new  thoughts  as  an  author  is  compelled 
to  do  for  the  unknown  multitude  of  his 
readers. 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  143 

Women  have  so  much  less  egotism,  so 
much  more  adaptability  than  men,  that,  if 
they  will  only  make  the  effort,  they  can 
easily  retain  their  ascendency  over  their 
husbands,  and  keep  up  the  interest  in  their 
lives. 

In  an  exceedingly  clever  novel  of  recent 
publication,  called  "A  Successful  Man," 
there  is  a  hint  of  one  of  the  perpetually 
recurring  tragedies  of  modern  life.  The 
matter  is  one  which,  by  common  consent, 
we  do  not  talk  much  about ;  which  in  each 
individual  case  we  do  our  best  to  ignore ; 
but  which  all  must  recognize  as  the  source 
of  much  unhappiness,  much  bitterness  of 
spirit.  A  man  marries  a  woman.  They 
sincerely  love  each  other,  and  are  ap 
parently  satisfying,  each  to  each.  The  man 
becomes  engrossed  in  affairs ;  the  woman  in 
domesticity  and  fashionable  life,  or  in  what 
ever  else  of  feminine  occupation  her  tastes 
and  circumstances  may  suggest.  Struggle 
is  good  for  the  man.  Contact  with  men, 
the  constant  attrition  of  mind,  the  strenu 
ous  contests  of  life, —  these  things  bring 


144          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

growth  to  him.  The  years  slip  by ;  and  he 
finds  himself  larger,  —  intellectually  devel 
oped  out  of  himself  into  a  new  an'd  higher 
manhood.  The  wife,  meanwhile,  has  been 
standing  still,  in  all  sweetness  and  purity ; 
but  she  has  not  grown.  She  is  the  same 
woman  she  was  at  the  wedding  time,  only 
a  few  years  older.  She  has  been  loyal  to 
her  duties.  She  has  brought  up  her  chil 
dren  well.  She  has  done  her  best  to  make 
her  house  a  home,  as  she  understands  the 
word ;  namely,  a  place  of  entire  comfort. 
But  she  has  lost  the  capacity  to  share  her 
husband's  thoughts  and  aspirations.  She 
has  not  grown  with  him  in  intellectual 
stature,  has  not  acquired  his  enlarged 
tastes,  has  not  fitted  herself  to  be  still  his 
most  valued  companion,  counsellor,  and 
friend.  He  must  seek  companionship  of 
that  kind  elsewhere,  —  in  his  club,  in  so 
ciety,  or  as  a  last  resort  he  must  find  a 
substitute  for  companionship  by  complete 
absorption  in  his  pursuits. 

In  the  novel,  which  suggests  all  this,  he 
finds   his   solace   in   the   love    of  another 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  145 

woman;  but  that  is  not  necessary  to  the 
completeness  of  the  tragedy.  The  tragedy 
comes  when  the  woman  recognizes  her 
lack  of  capacity  to  share  the  thoughts,  and 
be  the  companion,  of  the  man  whose  help 
mate  she  set  out  to  be.  There  is  no  rem 
edy  after  that;  and  the  tenderest,  loyal- 
est  devotion  on  the  part  of  the  man  can 
accomplish  nothing  of  repair.  The  woman 
knows  that  through  her  lack,  even  though 
it  be  not  through  her  fault,  the  marriage 
has  failed  of  being  what  it  was  meant  to 
be ;  and  if  she  be  sensitive,  and  the  man 
sympathetic,  the  very  affection  that  remains 
to  both  adds  to  the  distress  of  the  situa 
tion.  The  old  notion  of  woman  as  a 
domestic  animal,  a  petted  slave,  a  soft 
unthinking  minister  to  man's  comfort,  has 
been  put  aside.  Is  not  two  thirds  of  the 
misery  of  ill-mated  couples  dated  from  the 
decline  of  interest  of  the  husband  in 
the  wife,  when  her  beauty  begins  to  fade, 
and  she  has  nothing  deeper  to  charm  him? 
—  that  peerless  beauty  which  won  for 
her  the  intoxicating  admiration  of  himself 


146          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

and  others,  the  admiration  which,  suffered 
to-day,  becomes  necessary  to  her  happiness 
to-morrow. 

It  is  chiefly  for  admiration  that  women 
have  been  educated,  and  for  which  they 
continue  to  live.  To  present  a  pleasing 
exterior,  to  have  a  graceful  carriage,  to 
make  themselves  entertaining  in  society,  — 
these,  for  generations,  have  been  considered 
the  only  requisites  of  a  woman's  educa 
tion.  She  must  excite  admiration ;  or  else, 
in  common  parlance,  the  object  of  her 
destiny  —  marriage  —  may  never  be  at 
tained.  It  has  been  considered  a  matter  of 
comparatively  little  importance  whether  she 
possesses  deeper  and  more  fascinating  qual 
ities.  There  is  one  quality,  without  which 
all  the  fascinations  and  acquirements  of 
women  are  futile.  Beauty,  grace,  wk, 
erudition,  are  in  vain  without  that  inde 
scribable  something  we  call  personal  mag 
netism,  —  a  mysterious  influence  which 
never  has  been  dissected  by  science.  Its 
source  is  unknown,  its  extent  unlimited; 
but  it  is  the  strongest  weapon  a  woman  can 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  147 

wield.  Some  women  have  an  eloquence  in 
their  whole  persons,  which  touches  and  sets 
vibrating  chords  lying  wrapped  away  in  the 
veriest  secret  recesses  of  the  heart.  Women, 
it  is  said,  are  bourgeoise  in  their  judgments 
of  each  other.  They  cannot  understand. 
They  think  that  beauty  or  wit  will  master 
men.  Ah,  no;  the  mystery  lies  deeper. 
Many  completely  beautiful  women  are  en 
tirely  without  this  charm  ;  and  many  plain 
women  have  possessed  it  to  such  a  degree 
that  noted  beauties  have  been  unable  to 
contend  against  them  in  personal  influ 
ence.  Princess  Metternich,  one  of  the 
most  indisputably  ugly  women  of  the  cen 
tury,  was  one  of  the  most  charming.  Does 
any  one  imagine  that  Helen  of  Troy,  past 
forty,  and  Cleopatra,  past  thirty,  could 
have  changed  the  face  of  the  world  on  the 
strength  of  beauty  alone,  had  they  not  had 
this  mysterious,  unexplainable  gift  besides? 
Women  as  beautiful  have  perhaps  been 
born  into  the  world  many  times ;  but  they 
had  not  the  sorceress'  talisman  of  charm 
possessed  by  them.  Plutarch  says  of  the 


148          SN  MA  WEN  MEDITATION. 

peerless  Cleopatra  that  her  actual  beauty 
was  not  so  extraordinary  or  incomparable 
that  every  one  was  struck  by  it ;  but  her 
presence  and  effluence  were  irresistible. 
She  conquered  the  world's  conqueror ;  and 
this  alone  denotes  her  immeasurable  fasci 
nation.  She  was  fashioned  grand  as  the 
spirit  of  storm,  lovely  as  lightning,  cruel  as 
pestilence,  —  yet  with  a  heart.  This  charm 
—  the  gewisses  etwas  —  has  always  seemed 
to  me  to  spring  from  a  heart  full  of  feeling, 
whether  overflowing  or  concentrated  and 
stifled.  However,  this  power,  which  domi 
nates  and  fascinates,  is  as  rare  in  human 
beings  as  the  sentiment  which  it  inspires. 
Fortunately,  Providence  requires  no  such 
raging  torrents  to  turn  the  wheels  of  life. 
The  quiet  tides  of  the  instinct  of  mating 
are  enough. 

The  French,  in  speaking  of  a  charming 
woman,  say  she  has  a  cultivated  intellect 
and  a  cultivated  heart.  "  A  cultivated 
heart,"  —  how  little  attention  we  pay  to 
that  organ  in  comparison  to  the  time  and 
care  expended  upon  the  intellect !  People 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  149 

of  this  day  are  altogether  too  much  afraid 
of  the  power  of  "  emotion  "  in  a  woman. 
They  think  it  means  hysterics,  and  at 
once  proceed  to  throw  cold  water  over  it. 
These  are  they  who  are  unable  to  per 
ceive  the  difference  between  sentimental 
ity  and  sentiment,  which  is  only  the  power 
of  feeling  deeply.  It  is  not  the  cold,  prac 
tical,  purely  intellectual  women,  but  the 
women  capable  of  feeling,  who  are  the 
most  attractive  to  men,  and  retain  their 
influence  longest.  The  ideal  woman  is  as 
soft  as  she  is  strong.  And  we  cannot  but 
long  for  greater  quantity  of  the  capacity  for 
generous  enthusiasm,  the  capacity  for  warm 
love,  the  capacity  for  romantic  devotion. 
The  power  of  rich  and  delicate  emotion  is 
what  discloses  a  woman's  sympathies,  gives 
variety  and  color  to  her  whole  nature ;  and 
to  her  manner  gives  delicate  tact  and  fine 
intuitions. 

A  cynic  has  written  that  the  hearts  of 
men  are  like  grates  in  inns  where  the  wood 
is  laid  ready  for  kindling ;  and  the  smile  of 
any  pretty  woman  is  enough  to  set  it  in  a 


150         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

blaze.  If  this  be  true,  it  can  be  readily 
seen  that  there  is  no  safety  in  the  intrinsic 
charms  which  call  forth  only  admiration ; 
and  the  only  foundation  for  genuine  and  en 
during  love  is  the  inner  spirit  and  mental 
furnishing,  which  are  independent  of  the 
vicissitudes  of  fortune,  and  which  can  hold 
forever  the  wavering  fealty  of  any  but  the 
most  shallow  and  wicked  man.  It  is,  per 
haps,  this  lack  of  inherent  and  substantial 
charm  that  has  given  beauty  its  imme 
morial  association  with  misery,  and  caused 
the  poet  to  sing  so  sweetly  of  "  beauty  and 
anguish  walking  hand  in  hand."  Beauty 
is  generally  too  content  to  be  beautiful, 
and  misled  by  the  intoxication  of  flattery, 
has  taken  little  pains  to  secure  the  plainer 
gifts  which  remain  after  the  gilding  has 
worn  away.  It  has  mistaken  admiration 
for  love ;  and  the  mere  loss  of  their  accus 
tomed  incense  has  often  been  enough  to 
embitter  the  souls  of  men  and  women. 
Fame  is  only  a  large  form  of  admiration. 
All  young  and  ardent  souls  think  longingly 
of  fame,  and  are  seldom  discouraged  by  the 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  151 

universal  testimony  of  the  great,  that  fame 
is  very  barren  after  all. 

Great  women  especially  have  borne  wit 
ness  to  the  unsatisfactory  nature  of  fame. 
Is  this  because  of  the  traditions  of  the  char 
acter  of  women?  Or,  is  there  a  stronger 
inherent  longing  in  them  than  in  men  for 
love  and  loyalty? 

"  Fame  indeed,  ft  was  said, 
Means  simply  love.     It  was  a  man  said  that, 
And  then  there  's  love  and  love  ;  the  love  of  all, 
Is  but  a  small  thing  to  the  love  of  one." 

And  women,  on  the  whole,  have  made 
rather  poor  work  of  it  when  they  have  set 
out  to  get  admiration,  and  ignore  love. 
With  few  exceptions  (and  they  have  not, 
perhaps,  encountered  the  temptations  which 
beset  many  of  their  sisters),  they  have  ig- 
nominiously  succumbed  before  Cupid,  kiss 
ing  in  abject  submission  the  very  arrow 
that  has  slain  their  ambition,  content  as  long 
as  he  brings  to  them  the  single-hearted  de 
votion  of  one  man. 

Perhaps  woman  will  never  overcome  this 


152         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

tenderness  of  heart ;  perhaps  she  will  ever 
stand  ready  to  give  up  the  most  brilliant 
career  for  love,  happy  to  let  the  silver  flame 
of  her  genius  illumine  the  heart  and  lessen 
the  loneliness  of  the  one  man  she  loves. 
A  single  life,  though  enlivened  by  many 
duties  and  pleasures,  is  lonely  at  times  — 
beneath  the  deafness  of  space  and  the 
silence  of  the  stars.  But  give  him  one 
friend  who  can  understand  him,  who  will 
be  accessible  day  or  night,  one  friend,  one 
kindly  listener, — just  one,  —  and  the  uni 
verse  is  changed.  It  is  deaf  and  indifferent 
no  longer;  and  while  she  listens,  it  seems 
that  all  men  and  angels  listened  also,  so 
perfectly  his  thought  is  mirrored  in  the 
light  of  her  answering  eyes.  The  altar  of 
your  confidence  is  there  ;  the  end  of  your 
worldly  faith  is  there,  and  adorning  it  all 
and  sending  your  blood  in  passionate  flow, 
is  the  ecstasy  of  the  conviction  that  there, 
at  least,  you  are  beloved;  there  you  are 
understood;  there  your  errors  will  meet 
ever  with  gentlest  forgiveness ;  there  your 
troubles  will  be  smiled  away;  there  you 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  153 

may  unburden  your  soul,  fearless  of  harsh, 
unsympathizing  ears;  there  you  may  be 
entirely  and  joyfully  yourself.  If  the  deep 
diapason  of  gloom  rolls  out  from  your  soul, 
she  will  not  answer  it  with  a  wanton  jig, 
but  rather  with  a  touching  plaint  that  shall 
yet  have  a  hint  of  hope  in  its  soft  strains. 

All  the  conditions  of  marriage  may  be 
summed  up  in  the  one  word,  Love.  But 
Love,  the  chief  musician  of  the  world, 
must  find  an  instrument  worthy  of  his 
touch,  before  he  can  show  all  his  power 
and  make  heart  and  soul  ring  with  the 
lofty  strains  of  a  sublime  passion.  Not 
every  one  knows  what  love  means ;  few, 
indeed,  know  all  that  love  can  mean.  But, 
at  present,  love  is  an  idea  to  which  no 
clear  meaning  attaches.  Love  presumes 
youth,  as  a  rule ;  but  it  is  not  the  same 
thing  as  youth,  or  even  as  youth  with  warm 
and  mutual  liking  into  the  bargain.  Youth 
is  a  glorious  thing ;  but  it  has  its  own  dan 
gers,  and  the  chief  of  these  is  self-deception. 
Love  is  confidence,  mutual  understanding. 
With  this  love,  marriage  will  prove  no  fail- 


154         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ure,  but  the  highest  and  most  permanent 
of  earthly  relationships. 

And  two  lives  intertwined  with  mutual 
hopes  and  joys  and  sorrows  will  find  love 
glorified  and  intensified,  will  find  that  the 
deep  fulness  of  perfected  love  is  as  much 
dearer  than  its  dawning  dreams  as  the 
flower  in  perfect  beauty  is  lovelier  than  the 
opening  bud,  or  the  hope  fulfilled  is  better 
than  the  first  faint,  half-formed  wish.  What 
strength  is  given  by  this  love  and  bound 
less  trust  between  two  human  beings  !  It 
places  in  one's  heart  a  little  fortress,  which 
outside  influences  assail  in  vain,  which  is 
securely  stored  with  faith  and  confidence 
as  ammunition,  assured  affection  as  provi 
sions  ;  and  no  siege  can  weaken,  no  attack 
prove  dangerous. 

Wherever  love  is,  it  is  pure,  and  there 
has  been  no  time  in  the  world's  history 
when  its  light  has  been  extinguished.  In 
all  ages,  in  all  climes,  among  all  people, 
there  has  been  true,  pure,  and  unselfish 
love,  and  everywhere  at  all  times  the  cere 
mony  of  marriage  testifies  to  that  which  has 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  155 

happened  within  the  temple  of  the  human 
heart.  <  A  true  marriage  is  a  mutual  con 
cord  and  agreement  of  souls,  —  a  harmony 
in  which  discord  is  not  even  imagined ;  it 
is  the  uniting  of  two  mornings  that  hope  to 
reach  the  night  together.]) 

Each  has  found  his  ideal :  the  man  has 
found  the  one  woman  of  all  the  world,  the 
impersonation  of  affection,  purity,  love, 
beauty,  and  grace ;  and  the  woman  has 
found  the  one  man  of  all  the  world,  —  her 
ideal,  —  and  all  that  she  knows  of  romance, 
of  art,  of  courage,  of  heroism,  of  honesty, 
is  realized  in  him. 

Within  this  radiant  enclosure  of  conjugal 
relations  and  communion,  we  become  sure 
of  ourselves  and  our  companions.  The  dis 
guises  which  the  world  and  society  force  us 
to  wear,  the  various  deceptions  we  practise 
in  self-defence,  are  all  laid  aside  when  we 
come  into  the  presence  of  that  dear  com 
panion  to  whom  we  have  given  our  heart, 
and  from  whom  we  have  nothing  to  hide. 
When  love  opens  the  door  of  the  heart  and 
abandons  the  vigilance  and  defence  born  of 


156         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

suspicion  and  fear,  we  can  revel  in  joyous 
confidence,  and  can  lift  the  veil  that  has 
hitherto  screened  the  secrets  of  our  life. 

When  two  hearts  throb  with  a  common 
joy  and  hope,  when  two  lives  blend  as 
meeting  streams,  and  flow  on  as  one  for 
ever,  storms  may  smite  and  sorrows  startle, 
but  God  gave  to  love  a  potent  charm,  by 
which  the  storm  is  stilled,  the  stings  removed 
from  sorrow's  poisoned  fangs. 

Is  it  the  consciousness  of  all  these  glori 
ous  or  gloomy  possibilities  that  gives  to  a 
married  woman  that  unmistakable  air  of 
confidence,  an  exaggerated  notion  of  the 
value  added  to  her  opinions  by  the  act  of 
marriage?  You  can  see  it  in  her  air  the 
moment  she  walks  away  from  the  altar, 
keeping  step  to  the  wedding  march. 

This  assumption  of  superiority  is  perhaps 
the  hardest  thing  for  those  who  still  linger 
in  single  blessedness  to  bear  from  their 
self-congratulating  sisters. 

I  wonder  how  many  people  in  my 
acquaintance  could  claim  the  "Dunmow 
Flitch,"  of  which  Coleridge  writes,  —  a  relic 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  157 

of  a  Middle  Age  jest,  perpetrated  by  the 
monks  of  Dunmow  Priory,  in  the  east  of 
England. 

They  assumed  that  it  was  practically 
impossible  for  married  people  to  live  in 
harmony,  and,  to  prove  their  assumption, 
caused  it  to  be  known  that  if,  after  a  twelve 
month  of  married  life,  any  couple  could 
make  affidavit  that  they  had  not  quarrelled, 
had  not  regretted  their  marriage,  and  if 
they  could  live  their  lives  over  again  would 
do  just  as  they  had  done,  they  would  receive 
a  present  of  a  flitch  of  bacon,  be  placed 
in  chairs  of  honor,  and  have  their  names 
inscribed  on  the  Monastery  roll.  In  three 
hundred  years  it  was  granted  only  three 
times.  Though  numerous  applications  were 
made,  the  juries  of  men  and  women,  one 
half  married,  and  the  remainder  bachelors 
and  spinsters,  on  examining  the  claims 
decided  that  they  were  not  entitled  to  the 
honor. 

Marriage  in  its  widest  sense,  the  common 
work  of  man  and  woman,  is  the  question 
of  all  questions,  —  the  question  that  involves 


158          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

the  final  untying  of  every  knot  of  difficulty, 
and  determines  whether  or  not  we  are  to 
realize  the  idea  of  our  race.  But  notwith 
standing  all  our  science,  all  our  analysis  of 
the  tender  passion,  all  our  wise  jabber  about 
the  failure  of  marriage,  love  and  marriage 
are  still  personal  questions,  and  are  not  to 
be  reasoned  about  or  in  any  way  disposed 
of  except  in  the  same  old  way.  They  are 
subjects  of  which  no  one  can  have  more 
than  an  infinitesimally  small  atom  of  knowl 
edge.  Each  one  may  know  how  his  or  her 
marriage  has  turned  out ;  but  that,  in  com 
parison  with  a  knowledge  of  marriage  gen 
erally,  is  like  a  single  plant  in  comparison 
with  the  flora  of  the  globe.  The  utmost 
experience  on  the  subject  to  be  found  in 
this  country  extends  to  about  three  trials 
or  experiments.  A  man  may  become  twice 
a  widower  and  then  marry  a  third  time  ;  but 
it  may  be  easily  shown  that  the  variety  of 
his  feeling  is  more  than  counterbalanced 
by  its  incompleteness  in  each  instance,  for 
the  experiments,  to  be  conclusive,  should 
extend  at  least  over  half  a  lifetime. 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  159 

The  subject  of  marriage  generally  is  one 
of  which  men  know  less  than  they  know 
of  any  other  subject  of  universal  interest. 
People  are  nearly  always  wrong  in  their 
estimates  of  the  marriages  of  others;  and 
the  best  proofs  how  little  we  know  of  the 
real  tastes  and  needs  of  those  with  whom 
we  are  the  most  intimate  is  our  unfailing 
surprise  at  the  marriages  they  make.  The 
judgment  of  the  lady  who  said  of  her 
friends,  that  she  had  given  up  attempting 
to  understand  why  anybody  married  any 
body  else,  is  the  judgment  of  all  mankind 
in  all  grades,  where  free  choice  is  allowed 
at  all.  Every  one  knows  there  is  not  a 
circle  of  any  size  where  there  is  not  at  least 
one  couple  whose  marriage  was  pronounced 
unintelligible,  or  one  in  which  the  perplex 
ity  was  not  occasionally  deepened  by  obvi 
ous  ability  either  in  wife  or  husband.  What 
did  he  see  in  "her,"  or  she  in  "him,"  is 
sure  to  be  one  of  the  criticisms,  and  the 
one  to  which  there  is  rarely  a  reply.  Some 
times,  I  admit,  it  is  a  stupid  criticism,  due 
to  that  impenetrable  veil  which  hides  us 


160         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

from  each  other,  and  which  is  intended, 
perhaps,  to  deepen  the  individual  sense  of 
responsibility ;  but  very  often  it  is  true  as 
a  criticism  on  appearance  or  peculiarities 
of  mind  and  manner.  We  will  judge  things 
from  our  own  little  peak  of  observation,  for 
getting  there  are  always  souls  vibrating  to 
tunes  we  consider  foolish.  Yet  we  do  not 
hear  that  Memnon's  statue  gave  forth  its 
melody  at  all  under  the  rushing  of  the 
mightiest  wind,  or  in  response  to  any  other 
influence,  divine  or  human,  than  certain 
short-lived  sunbeams  of  morning.  And  we 
must  learn  to  accommodate  ourselves  to 
the  discovery,  that  some  of  those  cunningly 
fashioned  instruments  called  human  souls 
have  only  a  very  limited  range  of  music, 
and  will  not  vibrate  in  the  least  under  a 
touch  that  fills  us  with  tremulous  rapture 
or  quivering  agony. 

Our  ignorance  of  marriage  is  all  the 
darker,  that  few  men  tell  us  the  little  they 
know,  that  little  being  too  closely  bound 
up  within  that  innermost  privacy  of  life 
which  every  one  of  right  feeling  respects ; 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  161 

for  the  one  who  lifts  up  the  veil  of  married 
life  profanes  it  from  a  sanctuary  to  a  vulgar 
place. 

The  only  instances  made  bare  to  the 
public  view  are  the  unhappy  marriages, 
which  are  really  no  marriages  at  all.  An 
unhappy  alliance  bears  the  same  relation  to 
a  true  marriage  that  disease  does  to  health ; 
and  the  quarrels  and  the  misery  of  it  are 
the  crises  by  which  nature  tries  to  bring 
about  either  the  recovery  of  happiness  or 
the  endurable  peace  of  a  separation. 

How  to  be  happy,  though  married,  is  a 
matter  of  vast  importance  to  the  world ;  but 
being  still  a  "  looker-on  in  Vienna,"  I  am 
forced  to  deal  only  in  theories. 

I  wonder  if  this  is  not  the  best  way,  to 
leave  a  too  close  adherence  to  facts,  and 
study  marriage  as  it  appears  in  hope  and 
not  in  history;  for  each  woman  sees  her 
own  life  defaced  and  disfigured,  as  the  life 
of  others  is  not,  to  her  imagination.  Each 
woman  sees  over  her  own  experience  a  cer 
tain  stain  of  error,  while  that  of  others  looks 
fair  and  ideal.  Everything  seen  from  the 


1 62         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

point  of  the  intellect,  or  as  truth,  is  beauti 
ful.  But  all  is  sour  if  seen  as  experience. 
Details  are  melancholy,  though  the  plan  is 
seemly  and  noble.  What  a  charming  pic 
ture  Disraeli  draws  of  his  own  married  life 
in  one  of  his  novels :  "  The  lot  most  pre 
cious  to  man,  and  which  a  beneficent  Provi 
dence  has  made  not  the  least  common,  to 
find  in  another  heart  a  perfect  and  pro 
found  sympathy,  to  unite  his  existence  with 
one  who  could  share  all  his  joys,  soften  all 
his  sorrows,  aid  him  in  all  his  projects,  re 
spond  to  all  his  fancies,  counsel  him  in  his 
cares,  and  support  him  in  his  perils,  make 
life  charming  by  her  charms,  interesting  by 
her  intelligence,  and  sweet  by  the  vigilant 
variety  of  her  tenderness,  —  to  find  your 
life  blessed  by  such  an  influence,  and  to  feel 
that  your  influence  can  bless  such  a  life, 
the  lot  the  most  divine  of  divine  gifts,  so 
perfect  that  power  and  fame  can  never 
rival  its  delights." 

\As  I  sit  here  to-night,  I,  too,  can  weave 
a  future,  the  whole  piece  of  which  will  bear 
fair  proportions  and  perfect  figures,  like 


AFTER  A    WEDDING.  163 

those  tapestries  on  which  men  work  by 
inches,  and  finish  with  their  lives ;  or  like 
those  grand  frescos  which  poet-artists  have 
wrought  on  the  vaults  of  old  cathedrals,  — 
grand  and  colossal,  appearing  mere  daubs 
of  carmine  and  azure,  as  they  lay  upon 
their  backs  working  out  a  hand's  breadth 
at  a  time,  but  when  complete  showing 
symmetrical  and  glorious/) 

Is  not  my  position,  then,  an  enviable 
one?  Round  it  do  not  all  the  Muses 
chant,  as  I  dream  that  there  is  no  more 
beautiful  thing  than  the  joining  together 
of  two  souls  for  life,  to  strengthen  each 
other  in  all  peril,  to  rest  on  each  other  in 
all  sorrow,  to  minister  to  each  other  in  all 
pain,  to  be  one  with  each  other  in  silent, 
unspeakable  memories  at  the  moment  of 
the  last  parting? 


AFTER  ONE   SUMMER. 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER. 

"  The  angels  call  it  the  bliss  of  heaven, 
The  devils  call  it  hell's  torments  even, 
And  mortals,  they  call  it  Loving." 

TT  is  a  dull,  dreary  day,  —  a  day  when 
•*•  old  regrets  and  joys  deeply  buried 
from  human  eyes  call  from  their  graves 
with  shrill  voices,  that  sear  the  reason  and 
stun  the  will.  It  is  a  day  of  pitiless  intro 
spection,  when  wrongs  done,  kind  words 
unspoken,  love  estranged,  enmities  unfor- 
given  rise  up  to  confront  the  soul,  —  a  day 
in  which  only  minor  chords  are  sounded, 
whose  sad  and  wondrous  melodies  search 
the  subtlest  windings  of  the  heart.  It  is 
the  month  of  melancholy  days,  which  brings 
an  end  to  all  the  change  and  rapid  pleas 
ures  of  the  radiant  summer;  the  year  has 
passed  its  fevered  solstice,  and  subdued 
the  bold  and  passion-hued  emotions. 


1 68         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

It  is  the  month  for  reflection,  —  the  month 
that  raises  ghostly  memories  that  are  always 
with  us,  and  always  will  be  while  the  sad 
old  world  keeps  echoing  to  the  sob  of  long 
good-byes,  while  the  cruel  ships  sail  away 
across  the  great  sea,  and  the  cold  green 
earth  lies  .heavy  on  the  hearts  that  we  have 
loved. 

But  why  waste  the  strength  of  that  illumi- 
nous  point,  which  we  call  the  present,  in 
vain  repinings  for  the  "  might  have  been  "  ? 
No  regret  or  remorse  can  undo  the  past. 
The  record  of  each  act  is  written,  sealed, 
and  closed  forever.  Is  not  forgetting,  then, 
a  far  higher  art,  a  vastly  better  thing  than 
memory  ? 

I  have  no  wish  to  remember  everything. 
There  are  many  things  in  most  lives  that 
had  better  be  forgotten.  There  is  that  time 
many  years  ago,  when  we  did  not  act  quite 
as  justly,  quite  as  honorably,  as  we  should 
have  done ;  that  unfortunate  deviation  from 
the  path  of  strict  rectitude  we  once  com 
mitted,  that  act  of  folly,  of  meanness,  of 
wrong.  Ah,  well,  we  paid  the  penalty,  suf- 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  169 

fered  the  maddening  hours  of  vain  remorse, 
the  hot  agony  of  shame,  the  scorn,  perhaps, 
of  those  we  loved.  Oh,  Father  Time,  lift 
with  your  kindly  hand  those  bitter  memo 
ries  from  off  our  overburdened  hearts,  for 
griefs  are  ever  coming  to  us  with  the  com 
ing  hours,  and  our  little  strength  is  only  as 
the  day. 

Not  that  our  past  should  be  buried.  It 
is  but  the  poisonous  weeds,  not  the  flowers, 
we  should  root  out  from  the  garden  of 

^ 

Mnemosyne.  Do  you  remember  Dickeris's 
"  Haunted  Man,"  how  he  prayed  for  forget- 
fulness,  and  when  his  prayer  was  answered 
he  prayed  for  memory  once  more  ?  We  do 
not  want  all  the  ghosts  laid.  It  is  only 
the  reproachful,  cruel-eyed  spectres  that 
we  flee  from.  Let  the  gentle,  kindly  phan 
toms  haunt  us  as  they  will.  The  world 
grows  very  full  of  ghosts  as  we  grow  older. 
We  need  not  seek  in  dismal  churchyards, 
nor  sleep  in  moated  granges,  to  see  their 
shadowy  faces  and  hear  the  rustling  of  their 
garments  in  the  night.  Every  house,  every 
room,  every  creaking  chair,  has  its  own 


170         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

particular  ghost.  They  haunt  the  empty 
chambers  of  our  lives ;  they  throng  around 
us  like  dead  leaves,  whirled  in  the  autumn 
wind.  Some  are  living;  some  are  dead. 
We  clasped  their  hands  once,  loved  them, 
quarrelled  with  them,  laughed  with  them, 
told  them  our  thoughts  and  hopes  and 
aims  as  they  told  us  theirs,  till  it  seemed 
our  very  hearts  had  joined  in  a  grip  that 
would  defy  the  puny  power  of  Death. 
They  are  gone,  now;  lost  to  us  forever. 
Their  eyes  will  never  look  into  ours  again, 
and  their  voices  we  shall  never  hear.  Only 
their  ghosts  come  and  talk  to  us.  We  see 
them,  dim  and  shadowy  through  our  tears. 
We  stretch  our  yearning  hands  to  them, 
but  they  are  air.  Like  a  haunted  house, 
the  walls  of  memory  are  ever  echoing  to 
unseen  feet.  Through  the  broken  case 
ments,  we  watch  the  fleeting  shadows  of  the 
dead,  and  the  saddest  shadows  of  them  all 
are  the  shadows  of  our  own  dead  selves. 

An  old  philosopher  claims  that  if  one 
concentrates  reflection  too  much  on  one's 
self,  one  ends  by  seeing  only  what  one 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  171 

wishes ;  but  it  is  not  so,  for  if  we  answer 
honestly  the  questions  conscience  puts  to 
us,  those  answers  must  necessarily  prove 
how  we  have  used  the  limitless  freedom 
granted  us  as  individual  free  agents.  The 
choice  between  good  and  evil,  which  has 
been  our  own  willing  choice,  assumes  an 
appalling  responsibility;  and  one  grows 
frightened  and  dissatisfied  as  he  realizes 
how  far  he  has  wandered  from  that  ideal, 
the  attainment  of  which  has  been  so  ar 
dently  desired.  It  is  good  for  every  man 
and  woman  to  have  an  ideal  of  life,  if  it 
is  never  realized.  It  is  their  prerogative 
to  fix  the  end  of  their  existence  and  strive 
toward  it.  If  that  end  is  power  or  fame 
or  wealth,  it  is  the  craving  of  vanity ;  if  it 
is  simply  pleasure,  it  is  the  inspiration  of 
selfishness.  Whatever  it  is,  it  affects  char 
acter  and  determines  destiny. 

And  there  is  this  to  be  said  of  ideals  of 
nobler  sort :  they  cannot  lead  to  disap 
pointment  while  they  are  cherished  for  their 
own  sake.  The  artist  may  fail  to  paint  as 
he  would,  the  poet's  touch  may  miss  the 


172         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION, 

magic  string,  the  scientist  may  die  before 
his  work  is  completed,  the  patriot  may  live 
to  see  his  country  defeated  and  oppressed ; 
but  ideal  beauty,  truth,  and  goodness  are 
stars  that  shine  forever  above  the  storms 
and  wrecks  of  time. 

These  quiet  intervals  like  anniversaries 
remind  one  of  so  many  undertakings  left  un 
finished,  so  many  good  resolutions  broken. 
They  define  too  clearly  the  widening  gaps 
in  life  never  to  be  filled,  the  circle  of 
friends  narrowing  with  such  pitiless  speed 
and  certainty. 

Among  the  ghosts  that  haunt  me  to-day 
is  that  of  a  friend,  who,  pursuing  the  even 
tenor  of  his  way  through  life,  is  yet  dead 
to  me.  'T  was  only  a  misunderstanding ! 
How  many  there  are  who  can  trace  back 
broken  friendships  and  severed  lives  to  that 
one  thing,  —  "only  a  misunderstanding." 

The  tenderest  relations  are  often  the 
most  delicate  and  subtle ;  and  trifles  light 
as  air  may  scatter  and  utterly  destroy  the 
sensitive  gossamer  threads  extending  be 
tween  one  heart  and  another,  as  easily  as 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  173 

a  child's  passing  foot  destroys  the  spider's 
web  woven  on  the  dewy  grass  in  the  early 
morning. 

"  Only  a  misunderstanding  !  "  How  sim 
ple  the  words  are  to  write  !  How  unutter 
able  is  the  depth  of  their  meaning,  the 
infinity  of  the  loss  they  represent !  And 
I  had  trusted  him  as  holy  men  trust  God. 
Ah,  friend,  how  could  you  write  me  such 
words,  or  how,  once  written,  could  you  have 
the  heart  to  send  them  to  me,  weighted 
as  they  were  with  the  demons  of  doubt 
and  mistrust,  with  harshness,  suspicion,  and 
coldness  ? 

It  was  a  dangerous  experiment,  that 
friendship  with  pen  and  ink  and  paper. 

Ten  thousand  deviltries  may  lie  unsus 
pected  along  the  hastily  scribbled  words 
or  carefully  thought-out  phrases,  destined 
to  play  unutterable  havoc  when  the  seal 
shall  be  broken. 

A  letter,  what  thing  on  earth  more  dan 
gerous  to  confide  in?  A  letter  is  flippant 
if  it  reaches  you  in  a  serious  mood,  or 
dull  if  you  are  filled  with  life.  Written  at 


174          M  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

blood-heat,  it  may  reach  its  destination 
when  the  recipient's  mental  thermometer 
counts  zero ;  and  the  burning  words  and 
thrilling  sentences  may  turn  to  ice  and  be 
congealed  as  they  are  read.  Or,  penned 
in  irritation  and  anger,  they  may  turn  a 
melting  mood  to  gall,  and  raise  evil  spirits 
which  all  future  efforts  may  be  powerless  to 
exorcise.  A  letter  is  the  most  uncertain 
thing  in  a  world  of  uncertainties,  the  best 
or  the  worst  thing  devised  by  mortals. 

With  a  single  drop  of  ink  for  a  mirror, 
the  Egyptian  sorcerer  undertakes  to  reveal 
to  any  chance  comer  far-reaching  visions 
of  the  past.  With  one  drop  of  ink  from 
the  pen  of  a  friend  for  a  mirror,  I  saw  the 
beautiful  structure  of  friendship  crumble  and 
fade,  learned  that  friendship  was  but  a  name, 
found  that  the  world  had  changed  since  men 
thought  it  good  to  love,  natural  to  trust,  wise 
to  believe. 

Perfect  loyalty  and  faith  from  one's 
friends  would  make  existence  too  ideal; 
and  to  quote  Emerson,  friendship,  like 
immortality  of  the  soul,  is  too  good  to  be 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  175 

believed  in.  Our  friendships  hurry  to  short 
and  poor  conclusions,  because  we  have 
made  them  of  a  texture  of  dreams  instead 
of  the  enduring  fibre  of  the  human  heart. 
The  laws  of  friendship  should  be  austere 
and  eternal,  of  one  web  with  the  laws  of 
nature  and  of  morals.  All  friendship,  in 
fact  all  association,  must  be  a  compromise, 
and  each  has  to  descend  to  meet  the  other ; 
for  we  are  armed  all  over  with  subtle  an 
tagonisms,  which,  as  soon  as  we  meet,  begin 
to  play  and  soon  translate  all  poetry  to 
stale  prose. 

Real  friendship  should  not  be  glass  threads 
or  frost-work,  but  the  most  solid  thing  we 
know.  We  should  be  able  to  approach  our 
friend  with  audacious  trust  in  the  truth  of 
his  heart,  in  the  breadth,  not  to  be  over 
turned,  of  his  foundations.  Friendship 
seems  to  me  to  depend  principally  upon 
intrinsic  nobleness  and  contempt  of  trifles, 
and  has  two  sovereign  elements  in  its  com 
position.  One  is  truth.  A  friend  is  one 
with  whom  I  can  and  ought  to  be  sin 
cere.  Every  one  alone  is  sincere,  but  at 
the  entrance  of  a  second  person  hypocrisy 


176         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITA  TION. 

begins.  We  parry  the  approach  of  our 
fellow-men  by  compliments,  by  gossip,  by 
amusements,  by  affairs,  and  cover  up  our 
thoughts  from  him  under  a  hundred  folds. 
My  friend  should  be  the  one  before  whom 
I  may  think  aloud,  in  whose  real  and  equal 
presence  I  may  drop  those  garments  of  dis 
simulation,  courtesy,  and  second  thought, 
and  deal  with  him  with  perfect  simplicity. 

The  other  element  of  friendship  is  ten 
derness;  for  it  is  for  aid  and  comfort 
through  all  the  relations  and  passages  of 
life  and  death.  It  is  fit  for  serene  days 
and  graceful  gifts  and  pleasant  rambles ; 
but  its  tenderness  should  shine  over  rough 
roads  and  hard  fare,  shipwreck,  poverty, 
and  persecution.  This  is  the  friend  the 
heart  longs  for,  —  not  the  weak,  pulseless, 
forceless  thing  which  so  often  usurps  the 
name ;  but  an  honest,  loyal,  helpful  soul, 
that  lives  and  feels  and  suffers ;  dares, 
yet  does  not  change,  steadfast  amid  good 
report  and  evil  report,  true  in  word  and 
deed,  tender  in  weakness,  and  generous  in 
pain.  Such  an  one,  I  fear,  is  a  dream  and 
a  fable. 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  177 

You  proved  unequal  to  the  contest,  my 
friend ;  but  why  could  you  not  have  said, 
"I  am  sorry"?  How  hard  it  is  to  say 
these  little  words  !  yet  I  would  not  give 
much  for  either  a  man  or  a  woman  who 
could  not.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  com 
mon-sense  in  some  of  the  old  saws,  such 
as,  "  Honest  confession  is  good  for  the 
soul ;  "  "  A  sin  confessed  is  half  re 
dressed." 

There  is  something  very  real  and  sooth 
ing  in  that  odd,  warm  glow  which  comes 
to  one's  heart  in  gentle,  swelling  waves  of 
feeling,  after  the  fault  has  been  confessed 
or  the  misunderstanding  cleared  away,  and 
the  kiss  of  perfect  pardon  and  glad  com 
prehensiveness  has  consecrated  and  sealed 
anew  the  friendship  or  the  love.  He  who 
has  never  felt  this  weight  of  doubt  or  vexa 
tion  lifted,  and  the  warm,  trustful  belief 
born  again  all  fresh  and  holy,  has  missed 
one  of  the  purest  joys  to  be  tasted  upon 
earth.  I  pity  those  who  cannot  say  frankly 
and  freely,  "  I  am  sorry ;  "  for  the  three 
small  words  possess  a  mighty  magic  for 

12 


I  78         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

softening  angry  suspicion,  and  .healing  sore 
and  wounded  feelings,  where  grander  phrases 
are  powerless. 

Had  I  not  kept  well  the  compact  we 
made  so  many  years  ago  ?  But  a  question 
like  that  should  be  asked  in  far  different 
fashion,  hand  in  hand,  with  frank,  true  eyes, 
looking  the  reply  before  the  words  can  form 
themselves  in  speech. 

As  the  events  of  the  past  year  flit  like 
shadows  over  my  heart,  it  seems  as  if  all 
my  life  had  been  centred  in  this  one  meas 
ure  of  time ;  and  I  have  experienced  the 
most  transcendent  happiness,  the  most  ex 
quisite  pain.  The  consciousness  of  that 
pain  still  makes  me  weary ;  but  I  would  not 
have  it  cease  entirely,  for  it  is  the  seal  of 
the  actuality  of  experiences  that  are  very 
dear  to  me. 

Maidens,  they  say,  think  ever  of  lovers. 
In  tender  years,  these  visions  are  of  some 
impossible  heroes  of  romance.  But  they 
are  not  met  with  at  every  corner,  and  for 
many  years  we  are  striving  to  reconcile  facts 
and  theories,  experience  only  adding  to  our 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  179 

astonishment  at  the  disparity  between  the 
real  and  the  ideal. 

Many  a  woman,  it  seems  to  me,  does  not 
love  the  actual  man  she  marries,  though  she 
may  go  on  in  perfect  content  and  security, 
loving  an  ideal  to  which  she  has  given  his 
name.  If  the  lover  has  enough  of  the  ser 
pent's  wisdom,  and  she  of  the  innocence  of 
the  dove,  the  happy  illusion  may  last  to  the 
end  of  their  lives. 

No  man  is  as  high,  as  wide,  as  deep,  as  ) 
the  woman  who  loves  him  thinks  he  is ;  and  / 
his  care  ought  to  be  never  to  let  her  reach 
his  limitations.     He  cannot  possibly  reach 
her  ideal  of  him ;  but  let  him  artfully  veil 
the  point  where  he  stops  short. 

Women,  sometimes  realizing  their  own 
responsibility,  their  power  to  make  or  mar 
their  own  fortunes,  sigh  for  the  Sabine 
mode  of  courtship,  though  I  am  afraid  it 
would  be  more  annoying  than  gratifying 
to  be  swooped  up  by  any  rough  rider  who 
came  along,  and  "  wooed  and  married  and 
a'  "  before  they  even  knew  how  their  cap 
tors  looked.  Most  of  us  prefer  to  be 


l8o         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

wooed  before  we  are  won ;  and  although 
a  certain  amount  of  boldness  and  confi 
dence  are  conducive  to  the  success  of  a 
wooer,  an  excess  of  these  qualities  is  fatal 
to  his  hopes. 

A  brave  man  is  not  daunted  by  his  lady's 
frowns,  and  he  sweeps  aside  her  little  affec 
tations  and  pretences  as  he  does  the  train  of 
her  gown ;  but  as  he  can  move  across  the 
room  among  fifty  trains,  and  never  crush 
the  most  fragile  fabric  of  a  costume,  so  he 
will  not  wound  or  startle  the  smallest  of 
those  little  feminine  defences,  and,  even 
while  proceeding  in  calm  assurance  to  con 
quest,  will  never  abandon  the  role  of  defer 
ence  and  loyalty. 

If  men  could  only  realize  that  women 
have  as  many  atmospheric  rings  about  them 
as  the  planet  Saturn  !  Three  are  easily  to 
be  recognized.  There  is  the  wide  ring  of 
attraction,  which  draws  into  itself  all  that 
once  crosses  its  outer  border ;  these  re 
volve  around  her  without  ever  coming 
nearer.  Then  the  inner  ring  of  attraction  : 
those  who  come  within  its  irresistible  influ- 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  i8l 

ence  are  drawn  so  close  that  it  seems  they 
must  become  one  with  her  sooner  or  later. 
But  within  this  ring  is  another,  —  one  of 
repulsion,  which  love,  no  matter  how  en 
terprising,  no  matter  how  prevailing  or 
insinuating,  has  never  passed ;  and,  if  we 
are  to  judge  of  what  is  to  be  by  what  has 
been,  never  will. 

In  this  age  of  progress,  why  cannot  we 
carry  the  theory  of  evolution  into  love- 
making?  The  brute  woos  his  mate  by  a 
terrific  growl  and  a  cuff  on  the  ears  from 
his  mighty  paw.  He  terrifies  her  into  sub 
mission;  and  a  certain  savage  loyalty  in 
her  nature  responds.  Tribes  of  savages  in 
various  parts  of  the  world  seize  their  brides 
by  the  floating  hair,  or  attack  them,  and 
give  them  a  sound  drubbing,  by  way  of 
showing  the  force  of  their  affection.  One 
step  further  brings  us  to  William  the  Con 
queror,  who,  some  nine  hundred  years  ago, 
met  Matilda  of  Flanders  coming  from 
church,  and  dragging  her  from  her  palfrey, 
beat  her  soundly,  and  rolled  all  her  gay 
raiment  in  the  dirt.  Out  of  the  dirt  in 


1 82          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

which  William  rolled  Matilda,  grew  the  fair 
flower  of  chivalry  and  a  race  of  men  brave 
even  to  folly. 

Have  we  not  a  right,  then,  to  expect, 
with  the  progress  of  civilization,  lovers  who, 
retaining  all  their  courage  and  confidence 
in  presence  of  danger,  all  the  devotedness 
and  delicacy  to  the  lady  of  their  love,  will 
add  the  wisdom,  the  experience,  the  broader 
thought  of  the  nineteenth  century?  To 
such  a  lover  will  a  woman  gladly  yield  sub 
mission  and  all  the  lavish  loyalty  of  a 
woman's  nature,  not  because  he  demands, 
but  because  he  deserves  it. 

I  should  like  to  be  a  man  for  a  little 
while,  that  I  might  make  love  to  at  least 
two  or  three  women  in  a  way  that  would 
v  neither  shock  them  with  its  coarseness  nor 
starve  them  with  its  poverty.  As  it  is  now, 
most  women  deny  themselves  the  expression 
of  the  best  part  of  their  love,  because  they 
know  it  will  be  either  a  puzzle  or  a  terror 
to  their  lovers. 

Natures,  like  melodies,  have  their  key 
notes  ;  and  with  a  heart  stored  with  visions 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  183 

and  theories,  I,  too,  dreamed  of  the  hand 
that  would  strike  this  note,  would  make 
out  of  the  broken  sounds  of  life  a  song, 
and  of  life  itself  a  melody.  Eagerly  I 
listened  for  the  trumpet  note  that  would 
herald  his  coming.  I  did  not  know  that 
Love  is  very  humble-minded,  that  he  bids 
no  heralds  and  ambassadors  go  before 
him  with  blare  of  trumpets  and  waving  of 
banners.  He  comes  by  chance  along  quiet 
country  lanes,  on  crowded  city  crossings, 
in  gleams  of  moonlight,  on  dewy  lawns. 
Quick,  subtle,  and  fearless,  he  steals  upon 
us  gently  and  softly  without  observation. 
And  at  first  we  laugh  at  his  pretty  face, 
which  is  that  of  a  merry,  earthly  child  ;  but 
his  hands,  when  we  take  them,  grasp  like 
bands  of  iron,  and  his  strength  is  the 
strength  of  a  giant,  his  heart  the  heart  of 
a  tyrant.  And  he  gives  us  to  drink  of  a 
cup  in  which  sweet  is  mingled  with  bitter ; 
and  the  sweet  is  soon  forgotten,  and  the 
taste  of  the  bitter  remains.  And  we  hardly 
know  whether  to  bless  him  or  curse  him ; 
for  he  changes  all  things.  We  cannot  tell 


184         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

whether  to  weep  for  the  old  world  we  have 
lost,  or  shout  for  joy  at  the  new  world  we 
have  found. 

Love,  the  first,  the  greatest,  the  gen 
tlest,  the  most  cruel,  the  most  irresistible 
of  passions !  In  his  least  form  he  is 
mighty.  •  A  little  love  has  destroyed  many 
a  great  friendship.  The  merest  outward 
semblance  of  love  has  made  such  havoc 
as  no  intellect  could  repair.  The  reality 
has  made  heroes  and  martyrs,  traitors  and 
murderers,  whose  names  will  not  be  for 
gotten  for  glory  or  for  shame.  Helen  is 
not  the  only  woman  whose  smile  has 
kindled  the  beacon  of  a  ten  years'  war; 
nor  Antony  the  only  man  who  has  lost 
the  world  for  a  caress.  It  may  be  that 
the  Helen  who  shall  work  our  destruction 
is  even  now  twisting  and  braiding  her 
golden  hair;  it  may  be  that  the  new 
Antony  who  is  to  lose  this  same  old  world 
again  already  stands  upon  the  steps  of 
Cleopatra's  throne.  Love's  day  is  not  over 
yet;  nor  have  men  and  women  yet  out 
grown  the  power  of  love.  One  day,  without 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  185 

warning,   I  awoke,  and    found   the   world 
created  anew. 

There  is  a  story  in  the  Norse  religion  of 
two  lovers  who  declared  their  passion  to 
each  other  on  one  stormy  night  in  the 
depth  of  winter.  They  were  together  in  a 
desolate  hut  in  the  mountains,  and  around 
them  lay  unbroken  tracts  of  frozen  snow. 
And  it  happened,  after  they  had  sworn 
their  troth,  the  doors  of  the  snow-bound 
hut  flew  suddenly  open,  and  lo  !  the  land 
scape  had  changed :  the  hills  were  gay 
with  grass  and  flowers ;  the  sky  was  blue 
and  brilliant;  and  everywhere  was  heard 
the  ripple  of  waters  let  loose  from  their  icy 
fetters,  trickling  down  the  rocks  in  the 
joyous  sun.  This  was  the  work  of  the 
goddess  Friga ;  the  first  kiss  exchanged  by 
the  lovers  she  watched  over,  and  banished 
winter  from  the  land.  'T  is  a  pretty  story, 
and  true  all  the  world  over ;  for  every  time 
a  youth  looks  love  in  a  maiden's  eyes, 
and  sees  the  timid,  appealing  return  of  the 
universal  passion,  the  world  for  them  is 
just  as  surely  created  as  it  was  the  first 


1 86          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

morning,  in  all  its  color,  odor,  song,  and 
freshness. 

Blessed  be  the  capacity  for  being  fond 
and  foolish  !  If  a  letter  was  under  my  pil 
low  at  night,  if  this  new  revelation  was  last 
in  my  thoughts  as  I  fell  asleep,  if  it 
mingled  with  the  song  of  birds  in  the  spring 
morning,  as  some  great  good  pervading  the 
world,  —  is  there  anything  distinguishing  in 
such  an  experience  that  it  should  be  dwelt 
on?  The  youngness  of  the  year  seemed  to 
reveal  me  to  myself,  -*-  the  tenderness  of  the 
first  foliage,  the  tiny  leaves  uncurling  so 
gently,  the  sky  all  dotted  with  fleecy,  rain 
bow-tinted  clouds. 

All  innocent,  natural  impulses  respond  to 
this  subtle  influence.  One  may  well  gauge 
his  advance  in  selfishness,  worldliness,  and 
sin  by  his  loss  of  this  annual  susceptibility, 
by  the  failure  of  this  sweet  appeal  to  touch 
his  heart. 

Only  to  live  on  such  days  is  pure  hap 
piness  ;  but  to  live  with  the  knowledge  that 
another  heart  beats  with  you  and  for  you, 
another  warm,  living,  loving  human  being 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  187 

thinks  of  and  cares  for  you,  —  ah,  then  the 
happiness  is  doubled  and  intensified  ! 

I  heard  the  call  of  the  birds,  I  inhaled 
the  odor  of  the  New  Year,  I  was  conscious 
of  all  that  was  gracious  and  inviting  in  the 
scene ;  but  in  my  sub-consciousness  there 
was  only  one  thought,  —  I  loved. 

I  loved  the  soft,  sweet  earth,  the  dawn 
of  it,  and  the  twilight  of  it ;  I  loved  the 
sun  in  his  rising  and  in  his  setting ;  I  loved 
the  moon  in  her  fulness  and  in  her  wan 
ing  ;  I  loved  the  glorious  light  of  day  for 
its  splendor  of  heat  and  greenness ;  I  loved 
the  gloom  of  night  for  its  softness,  for  the 
song  of  the  birds  in  the  ivory  moonlight, 
and  the  odor  of  the  sleeping  flowers  in  the 
garden.  Ah,  how  I  longed  for  all  these 
sweet  voices  of  the  earth,  all  these  tuneful 
tongues  of  the  air,  that  I  might  tell  you  how 
I  loved  you  ! 

Love  did  not  consist  for  me  in  any  one 
particular  symptom  or  confession,  in  any 
external  circumstance  against  which  I 
could  have  fortified  myself.  It  was  an 
invisible  miasma,  diffused  in  the  surround- 


1 88          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ing  atmosphere,  in  the  air  and  light,  in  my 
longing  soul.  My  beloved,  you  were  in 
every  cloud,  every  stretch  of  blue  ether,  in 
the  wind,  every  picture  that  came  before 
my  eyes.  I  grew  parched,  restless,  faint 
sometimes,  thinking  of  you ;  but  then  again 
the  memory  of  you  revived  me,  like  the 
warmth  of  the  sun  and  the  cool  breath  of 
the  wind.  What  few  days  in  the  year  or 
in  a  whole  life  do  we  really  live  !  We  sleep, 
wake,  perform  a  certain  number  of  duties 
or  pleasures,  and  then  sleep  again.  Who 
can  call  that  living?  Only  a  few  days, 
perhaps  a  few  hours,  out  of  a  whole  life 
can  be  gathered  out  of  the  long  stretch  of 
years. 

Love  annihilates  time.  With  love,  as 
with  God,  time  is  not.  Like  the  miracles, 
it  brings  into  use  the  seonial  measurement, 
in  which  "  one  day  is  as  a  thousand  years." 
Oh,  Love,  what  eternities  of  time  canst 
thou  bury  in  one  moment ! 

At  the  instant  when  I  realized  that  I  was 
beloved,  that  I  loved,  if  God  had  struck 
all  with  immobility ;  if  the  sun,  as  a  witness, 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  189 

had  remained  with  its  disk  half  hidden 
behind  those  dark  firs  which  seemed  the 
fringed  lashes  of  the  eye  of  Heaven;  if 
light  and  shade  had  remained  thus  blended 
on  the  purple  mountain-tops;  the  same 
look  reflected  from  your  eyes,  holding  all 
shadow  and  light,  all  love  and  pain,  in  their 
depths,  —  I  should  have  been  able  to  com 
prehend  eternity  in  one  instant,  infinity  in 
one  sensation. 

Love  of  this  sort  is  hardly  distinguishable 
from  religious  feeling.  What  deep  or  worthy 
love  is  so,  whether  of  man,  of  child,  of  art, 
or  music? 

Our  caresses,  our  tender  words,  our  still 
rapture  under  the  influence  of  autumn 
sunsets  or  pillared  vistas  or  Beethoven 
symphonies,  —  all  bring  with  them  the  con 
sciousness  that  they  are  mere  waves  and 
ripples  in  an  unfathomable  ocean  of  love 
and  beauty.  Our  emotion  in  its  keenest 
moment  passes  from  expression  into  si 
lence  ;  our  love  at  its  highest  flood  rushes 
beyond  its  object,  and  loses  itself  in  the 
sense  of  divine  mystery. 


1 90         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

My  lover  came,  not  as  a  warrior,  but 
with  stealthy  tread ;  not  with  the  blazing 
sunlight  on  his  armor,  but  in  the  sweet,  dim 
twilight  I  found  him  at  my  side,  —  on  his 
face  the  familiar  grace  of  a  friend.  To 
gether  we  had  shared  many  hours  of  study, 
together  we  had  trod  the  difficult  paths  of 
intellectual  toil.  We  had  studied  German, 
until  "  Ich  Hebe  dich "  tripped  from  my 
tongue  with  perfect  accent.  And  when  he 
murmured,  " Je  vous  adore"  I  compre 
hended  all  the  intricacies  of  the  French 
verb,  even  to  the  perfect  and  pluperfect 
tenses.  We  read  the  same  books,  we 
walked,  we  talked ;  and  in  every  pursuit,  I 
was  cheered  by  the  sweetness  and  en 
couraged  by  the  strength  of  his  beloved 
companionship,  until  the  dream  of  my  life 
was  to  associate  him  with  all  I  did.  I  did 
not  know  this  was  "love."  I  was  inter 
ested,  I  knew.  Beware  that  word,  O 
maidens  !  Interested  means  far  more  to 
women  than  to  men.  "  In  love "  is  the 
same  thing;  but  that  is  an  expression 
which  women  are  chary  of  using,  unless 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  191 

of  men.  According  to  one  philosopher,  it 
is  tacitly  assumed  that,  as  it  is  not  the 
proper  thing  for  woman  to  fall  in  love 
until  she  has  been  asked,  she  never  does ; 
and  falling  in  love  is  with  most  women  a 
purely  voluntary  act.  When  entreated  to 
lose  their  hearts,  they  lose  them,  should  it 
seem  judicious,  all  things  considered,  so  to 
do. 

But  as  in  Latin  grammar,  so  in  life,  there 
are  exceptions  to  all  rules ;  and  while  in 
nine  cases  out  of  ten,  women  are  guided  by 
judgment  and  reason,  men  impelled  by 
passion  and  instinct,  there  is,  after  all,  a 
tenth  case,  where  a  woman,  deluded  by  her 
imagination,  wrecks  her  life  on  breakers 
that  seemed  to  others  too  apparent  to  need 
a  beacon.  Could  I  have  reasoned  so  wisely 
a  year  ago  ?  If  so,  perhaps  I  would  not  have 
acted  so  foolishly. 

And  the  saddening  thought  that  follows 
acts  of  folly  is,  there  is  no  returning  on  the 
road  of  life.  The  frail  bridge  of  time  on 
which  we  tread  sinks  back  into  eternity 
at  every  step  we  take.  The  past  is  gone 


192          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

from  us  forever.  It  is  gathered  in  and 
garnered.  It  belongs  to  us  no  more. 
No  single  word  can  ever  be  unspoken, 
no  single  step  retraced. 

Questionings  came  to  me,  and  serious 
questionings.  For  habit  is  almost  as  strong 
as  love ;  and  the  odd  ways  of  life  and 
thought  will  reassert  themselves  in  a  thought 
ful  mind,  and  reason  will  insist  on  analyzing 
passion  and  even  hope.  But  all  were  an 
swered  when  I  looked  into  the  eyes  of 
my  loved  one  with  glance  half-wondering, 
half-shrinking,  and  saw  that  for  which  my 
soul  had  longed. 

The  countenance  is  an  instrument,  whose 
keys,  swept  by  one  look  of  passion,  trans 
mit  from  soul  to  soul  mysteries  of  mute 
communion  which  cannot  be  translated  into 
words ;  but  I  felt  the  repose  of  the  heart 
from  having  met  with  the  long-sought  ob 
ject  of  its  restless  adoration,  the  peace  that 
comes  from  the  satisfying  of  that  vague, 
unquiet  feeling  which  agitates  the  soul,  and 
which  mingles  with  our  hearts  as  our  sighs 
with  the  air.  I  had  waited  so  long  and 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  193 

it  had  come  so  suddenly,  this  cyclone  of 
love  !  As  I  rested  upon  that  brave  heart 
with  upturned  face  but  closed  lids,  from 
beneath  which  forced  their  way  drop  after 
drop  of  happy  tears ;  as  I  rested  upon  that 
strong  arm,  drunk  with  the  wine  of  young 
love,  —  the  past  was  forgot,  the  future  ban 
ished,  and  I  lived  only  in  the  delicious  and 
dreamy  present,  wrapped  in  rose-colored, 
incense-breathing  mist,  which  shut  out  the 
whole  world.  From  afar  came  floating  to 
my  ear  the  sounds  of  life  and  laughter, 
meaningless  and  inane. 

All  things  else  seemed  shams.  Love 
alone  was  real.  "Only  one  thing  really 
counts,"  they  say,  —  only  one  thing,  love. 
Nothing  else  endures  to  the  end ;  nothing 
else  is  of  any  worth.  And  then  I  believed 
what  they  said,  that  love  alone  is  worth 
living  for,  worth  dying  for ;  believed  that  it 
is  the  only  satisfying  good  we  can  grasp  at 
among  the  shifting  shadows  of  our  brief 
existence ;  that  in  its  various  phases  and 
different  workings  it  is,  after  all,  the  bright 
est  radiance  known  in  the  struggling  dark- 
13 


194          M  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

ness  of  our  lives ;  believed  that  many  sins 
can  be  washed  away  by  love,  and  become 
purified  and  redeemed.  What  is  there  that 
love  cannot  hallow?  Barren  places  blos 
som  and  become  green  if  love  smiles  upon 
them.  Darkness  turns  to  light,  loneliness 
to  sympathy,  doubts  become  blessed  truths ; 
and  all  things  mortal  and  tangible,  shadowy 
and  unreal,  lose  every  power  of  evil  and 
turn  each  ill  to  good. 

Perhaps  the  little  cigarette-maker  had 
found  the  definition  of  true  love  when  she 
said,  "  It  is  something  I  cannot  explain ;  it 
is  something  holy." 

Some  one  told  me  once  that  "Love 
excuses  all  things,  but  we  must  be  sure  that 
it  is  love."  What  sad  words,  the  saddest 
any  one  could  write  !  What  infinite  possi 
bilities  they  suggest !  What  boundless  sor 
row,  when  the  awakening  shall  come,  and 
one  discovers  the  paltry  imitations  which 
have  been  mistaken  for  the  original,  the  base 
coin  believed  to  be  of  sterling  gold  !  How 
can  one  ever  be  sure  of  finding  real  love, 
when  the  devil  himself  has  not  half  the  dis- 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  195 

guises  that  love  can  assume  at  command? 
—  and  Satan's  imagination,  lively  as  it  is, 
grows  absolutely  uninventive  in  comparison 
with  Cupid's.  Yet,  on  the  other  hand,  may 
not  too  much  caution  lose  the  best  thing 
life  can  give,  leaving  in  exchange  regret 
and  remorse  as  one's  twin  companions  to 
the  grave? 

No  such  thoughts  came  to  us  to  mar  the 
happiness  of  love's  young  dream  as  the 
days  passed  swiftly  by. 

We  read  no  books  that  were  not  tales 
of  love.  One  heavenly  day,  so  clear  that 
God's  own  truth  seemed  to  pierce  the  sky 
above,  descending  in  shafts  of  light,  —  a 
day  when  the  cloudless  sky  revealed  through 
all  its  exquisite  transparency  that  inex 
pressible  tenderness  which  no  painter  and 
no  poet  can  re-image,  that  unutterable 
sweetness  which  no  art  of  man  can  ever 
shadow  forth,  and  which  none  may  ever 
comprehend  though  we  may  feel  it  in  some 
strange  way,  akin  to  the  luminous,  unspeak 
able  charm  that  makes  us  wonder  at  the 
eyes  of  a  woman  when  she  loves,  —  that 


196          77V  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

day  we  read  together  a  love-story,  whose 
pathos  awakened  all  the  tenderness  in  our 
hearts.  There  is  something  in  us  that 
quickly  responds  to  a  real  touch  of  the 
pathetic.  We  read  a  book,  eminently  stu 
pid,  but  one  sentence,  one  small  line  which 
conies  unexpectedly  in  the  middle  of  a 
page,  will  touch  us  to  sympathy,  bring  hot 
tears  to  our  eyes  and  a  painful  wedge  in 
our  throats. 

This  story  of  a  tried,  faithful  heart  (how 
vividly  I  recall  the  scene,  almost  the  very 
words  !)  was  told  by  a  Frenchman  who  had 
visited  the  Island  of  Corsica. 

His  story  runneth  thus :  "  One  night, 
after  ten  hours'  walking,  I  reached  a  little 
dwelling  quite  by  itself  at  the  bottom  of  a 
narrow  valley,  which  was  about  to  throw 
itself  into  the  sea,  a  league  further  on. 
The  two  steep  slopes  of  the  mountain, 
covered  with  brush,  with  fallen  rocks,  with 
great  trees,  shut  in  the  lamentably  sad 
ravine,  like  two  sombre  walls. 

"  The  woman  who  received  me  was  old, 
severe,  and  neat.  The  man,  seated  on  a 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER. 


I97 


straw  bed,  rose  to  salute  me,  then  sat  down 
again  without  saying  a  word.  His  com 
panion  said  to  me  :  '  Excuse  him ;  he  is 
deaf  now.  He  is  eighty-two  years  old.' 

"She  spoke  the  French  of  France.  I 
was  surprised.  I  asked  her,  'You  are  not 
of  Corsica?' 

" '  No ;  we  are  from  the  Continent.  But 
we  have  lived  here  fifty  years.' 

"A  feeling  of  anguish  and  of  fear  seized 
me  at  the  thought  of  that  fifty  years,  passed 
in  this  gloomy  hole,  so  far  from  the  dwell 
ings  of  men. 

"When  the  short  repast  was  finished,  I 
went  and  sat  down  before  the  door. 

"My  heart  was  pinched  by  the  melan 
choly  of  the  mournful  landscape,  wrung  by 
the  distress  that  sometimes  seizes  travellers 
on  certain  sad  evenings,  in  certain  desolate 
places.  It  seems  that  everything  is  near 
its  ending,  existence  and  the  universe 
itself.  You  perceive  sharply  the  dreadful 
misery  of  life,  the  isolation  of  every  one, 
the  nothingness  of  all  things,  and  the  black 
loneliness  of  the  heart,  which  nurses  itself 


1 98          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

and  deceives  itself  with  dreams  until  the 
hour  of  death. 

"The  old  woman  came  out  and  talked 
to  me,  and  finally,  having  learned  who  she 
was,  the  memory  of  it  all  came  back. 

"  It  had  caused  once  a  great  scandal 
among  the  nobility  of  Lorraine.  A  young 
girl,  beautiful  and  rich,  had  run  away  with 
an  under-officer  in  the  regiment  of  hussars 
commanded  by  her  father.  He  was  a 
handsome  fellow,  the  son  of  a  peasant, 
and  he  carried  well  his  blue  dolman,  this 
soldier  who  had  captivated  the  colonel's 
daughter. 

"  She  had  seen  him,  noticed  him,  fallen 
in  love  with  him,  doubtless,  while  watching 
the  squadrons  filing  by.  But  how  she  had 
got  speech  of  him,  how  they  had  managed 
to  see  one  another,  to  hear  from  one  an 
other,  how  she  had  dared  to  let  him  under 
stand  she  loved  him,  that  was  never  known. 
Nothing  was  divined,  nothing  suspected. 
One  night,  when  the  soldier  had  just  fin 
ished  his  time  of  service,  they  disappeared 
together.  Her  people  looked  for  them  in 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  199 

vain.  They  never  received  tidings,  and 
they  considered  her  as  dead.  So  I  found 
her,  in  this  sinister  valley. 

"Tears  fell  from  her  eyes  as  she  talked 
of  her  home  and  loved  ones;  but  she 
pointed  to  the  old  man,  motionless  on 
the  threshold  of  his  hut,  and  said  softly, 
'That  is  he.' 

"And  I  understood  that  she  loved  him 
yet,  that  she  still  saw  him  with  bewitched 
eyes. 

"  I  asked,  '  Have  you  at  least  been 
happy  ? ' 

"  She  answered,  with  a  voice  that  came 
from  her  heart,  'Oh,  yes,  very  happy.  He 
has  made  me  very  happy.  I  have  never 
regretted." 

"  I  looked  at  her,  sad,  surprised, 
astounded,  by  the  sovereign  strength  of 
love.  This  rich  young  woman  had  fol 
lowed  this  man,  this  peasant.  She  was 
become  herself  a  peasant  woman.  She 
had  made  for  herself  a  life  without  charm, 
without  luxury,  without  delicacy  of  any 
kind. 


200          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

"And  she  loved  him  yet. 

"  Still  young,  she  had  abandoned  life  and 
the  world  and  those  who  had  brought  her 
up  and  who  had  loved  her.  She  had  come 
alone  with  him,  in  this  savage  valley,  and  he 
had  filled  her  life  with  happiness.  And  he 
had  been  everything  to  her,  —  all  that  one 
desires,  all  that  one  dreams  of,  all  that  one 
waits  for  without  ceasing,  all  that  one  hopes 
for  without  end." 

And  we  who  loved,  gazing  into  each 
other's  eyes  so  filled  with  tears,  swore  that 
our  love  should  be  eternal,  that  in  our  love 
should  be  neither  to-day  nor  yesterday, 
only  always  believing  that  Time  with  all 
his  power  over  hours  had  none  over  our 
souls. 

Clear  and  sweet  in  my  memory  is  one 
walk  in  the  moonlight.  Our  souls  were 
filled  with  the  yearning  melancholy  the  light 
of  the  moon  induces,  distracted  and  moved 
by  the  grand  and  serene  beauty  of  the  pale- 
faced  night.  Silent  we  were,  but  happy  in 
that  "consciousness  of  presence"  which  is 
the  essence  of  real  companionship. ;  With 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  2OI 

hands  clasped,  we  contemplated  the  plain, 
bathed  with  a  soft  brilliance,  inundated  by 
a  caressing  radiance,  drowned  in  the  ten 
der  and  languishing  charm  of  the  serene 
night. 

If  the  night  is  destined  for  sleep,  for 
unconsciousness,  for  repose,  for  forgetful- 
ness  of  everything,  why,  then,  make  it  more 
charming  than  the  day,  sweeter  than  the 
dawns  and  the  sunsets  ?  —  and  this  slow, 
seductive  star,  more  poetical  than  the  sun, 
and  so  discreet  that  it  seems  designed  to 
light  up  things  too  delicate,  too  mysterious 
for  the  great  luminary.  Why  does  the  clever 
est  of  all  songsters  not  go  to  rest?  Why 
these  quiverings  of  the  heart,  this  emotion 
of  the  soul,  this  languor  of  the  body?  God 
has  surely  made  such  nights  to  clothe  with 
the  ideal  the  loves  of  men. 

And  thus  we  pampered  and  cherished 
love.  Wer  besser  liebt?  I  know  not,  for 
each  was  happy  in  the  belief  that  his  talent 
for  loving  had  never  been  excelled.  And 
no  voice  whispered  to  me  in  my  delirium 
that  — 


202          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

"  Hearts,  like  all  things  underneath  God's  skies, 
Must  sometimes  feel  the  influence  of  change." 

No  whisper  warned  me  that  his  throbbing 
heart  was  ominous  of  storm  and  wreck ;  no 
warning  was  breathed  that  those  eyes,  so 
tender,  soft,  and  loving  now,  might  one 
day  fill  my  soul  with  dread  by  their  stern, 
reproachful  glances.  No  ;  I  only  pillowed 
my  head  upon  that  arm,  my  heart  upon 
that  hope,  and  dreamed. 

In  sorrowful  fondness  we  approached 
the  time  for  separation,  lingering  tenderly 
over  each  hour  as  it  passed  so  fleetly,  and 
the  last  day  came,  —  the  saddest,  the  most 
sentimental  of  all  days. 

The  boy  when  he  leaves  school,  where  he 
has  been  fagged  and  bullied  and  flogged, 
on  this  last  day  looks  around  with  choking 
throat  upon  the  dingy  walls  and  battered 
desks.  Even  the  convict,  who  is  about  to 
be  released  after  years  of  imprisonment, 
feels  a  sentimental  melancholy  in  gazing 
for  the  last  time  upon  the  whitewashed 
walls.  The  world,  which  underrates  the 
power  of  temptation,  is  distrustful  as  to  the 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  203 

reality  of  repentance,  will  probably  prove 
cold  to  him.  How  much  more  mournful, 
then,  to  behold  the  last  day  with  a  loved 
one  ?  How  we  trembled,  not  alone  at  the 
pain  of  parting,  but  at  the  thought  of  when 
and  how  we  were  to  meet  again  !  We 
would  fain  have  uttered  some  great  word 
of  love  and  courage ;  some  thought  which 
would  go  with  us  through  lonely  years, 
and  uphold  us  with  its  wondrous  strength ; 
some  benediction  of  such  rare  tenderness 
it  should  seem  from  God  himself;  but  our 
lips  could  only  tremble  with  that  old,  old 
word  fraught  with  heart-break,  "Good-by." 
Ah,  lover,  friend,  beware  of  parting  !  From 
the  passionate  farewell  to  the  one  who  has 
your  heart  in  his  keeping  to  the  cordial 
good-byes  exchanged  with  pleasant  compan 
ions  at  a  watering-place,  a  cord  stronger  or 
weaker  is  snapped  asunder  in  every  parting, 
and  Time's  busy  fingers  are  not  practised 
in  resplicing  broken  ties.  Meet  again  you 
may ;  will  it  be  in  the  same  way,  with  the 
same  sympathies,  with  the  same  sentiments  ? 
Will  the  souls,  hurrying  on  in  diverse  paths, 


204          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

unite  once  more,  as  if  the  interval  had  been 
a  dream? 

A  poet  hath  said,  "  Eternity  itself  cannot 
restore  the  loss,  struck  from  the  minute." 
Are  you  happy  where  you  tarry  with  per 
sons  whose  voices  are  melodious  to  your 
ear?  Beware  of  parting,  or,  if  part  you 
must,  say  not  in  insolent  defiance  to  time 
and  destiny,  What  matters?  we  shall  soon 
meet  again. 

Alas  and  alas  !  when  I  think  of  the  lips 
that  murmured,  "Soon  meet  again,"  and 
remember  how  in  heart,  soul,  and  mind 
we  stood  divided  the  one  from  the  other 
when,  once  more  face  to  face,  we  each  inly 
exclaimed,  "  Met  again  ! " 

The  letters  that  followed  me  breathed 
the  tenderest  devotion ;  in  them  it  seemed 
that  nothing  evaporated  during  the  slow 
and  dull  transition  of  the  feeling  to  the 
mood,  which  often  lets  the  lava  of  the 
heart  cool  and  pale  beneath  the  pen  of 
man.  And  my  thoughts  by  day,  my  dreams 
by  night,  were  tinged  with  rosy-tinted  hopes 
of  receiving  his  letters.  Nothing  feeds  the 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  205 

flame  like  a  letter.  It  has  intent,  perso 
nality,  secrecy.  Quickly  I  answered  them. 
My  letters  were  not  freighted  with  wisdom  ; 
for  did  I  not  know  that  the  wisdom  he  liked 
best  in  me,  and  found  the  wisest,  was  the 
folly  of  love  ?  I  knew  it,  and  loved  him  for 
his  wise  folly ;  and  he  loved  me  in  return  for 
my  foolish  wisdom. 

The  change  came ;  how,  I  know  not, 
even  now.  Perhaps  I  was  to  blame.  He, 
too,  was  unreasonable. 

"Alas,  how  light  a  cause  may  move, 
Dissension  between  hearts  that  love,"  — 

misunderstandings,  doubts  that  are  the 
drops  that  fall  from  the  eaves  upon  the 
marble  corner-stones,  and,  by  ever  falling, 
wear  furrows  in  the  stone  that  the  whole 
ocean  cannot  soften. 

Ah,  love,  you  made  me  weep  bitter  tears 
of  alternate  self-reproach,  indignation,  and 
finally  complete  bewilderment  as  to  this  un 
happy  condition  of  affairs.  Believe  me,  tears 
like  these  are  not  good  to  mingle  with  love  ; 
they  are  too  bitter,  too  scorching;  they 


206          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

blister  love's  wings,  and  fall  too  heavily  on 
love's  heart. 

It  seemed  to  me  then  as  if  half  the  world 
were  dead,  every  bright  face  darkened,  as 
if  beneath  a  leaden  sky,  with  stars  and  moon 
and  sun  gone  out,  every  flower  was  withered, 
every  hope  extinguished. 

It  was  something  of  a  bore,  at  first,  to 
take  up  the  old  round  of  ceaseless  gayety 
and  levity.  He  had  taught  me  to  find 
amusement  and  occupation  in  so  many 
things  that  were  better  and  higher  than  any 
pleasures  or  pursuits  I  had  known  before. 
I  shall  always  remember  it,  and  show,  in 
my  acquirements  and  manner  of  living,  the 
good  effects  of  the  hours  we  had  been  to 
gether.  At  times  it  would  come  over  me 
like  a  blast  of  icy  air  that  I  could  never  talk 
over  things  with  him  again.  No  more  of 
those  journeys  to  picture  galleries  and 
book-stores,  no  more  tete-a-tete  luncheons, 
no  more  long  rides  across  the  country.  At 
least  it  was  an  education  to  have  known  and 
loved  such  a  man.  It  has  fixed  my  ideals, 
and  deepened  my  sense  of  the  possible 
beauty  of  existence. 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  207 

The  brilliant,  distracting  summer  that 
followed  was  spent  at  a  beautiful,  attrac 
tive  place  in  an  elevated  mountain  region, 
where  one  meets  the  most  cordial  society 
in  the  world,  —  charming  people,  who  meet 
as  the  seaweed  meets  on  the  crest  of  the 
wave  of  many  colors  from  many  distant 
depths,  intermingling  for  a  time  in  the 
motion  of  the  waters,  to  part  company, 
under  the  driving  of  the  north  wind, 
drifted  at  last,  forgetful  of  each  other,  by 
tides  and  currents  to  the  opposite  ends  of 
the  earth. 

Amid  these  brilliant,  shifting  scenes,  there 
were  days  of  utter  weariness,  when  longing, 
aching  arms  were  stretched  out  to  empty 
space,  when  my  heart  seemed  hungry,  with 
only  stones  for  food,  —  days  when  flowers 
seemed  without  scent  or  color,  trees  bare 
of  foliage,  birds  with  no  note  of  song,  and 
all  glad  things  were  turned  to  mocking 
memories  ;  days  when  underlying  the 
dance- music  was  an  indescribable  pathos, 
a  heart-ache  behind  all  the  laughter,  a 
weariness  below  all  the  rapid  movement, 


208          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

a  question,  a  doubt,  a  misgiving  under  all 
the  radiance  and  joy.  But  in  time,  — 
shall  I  confess  it  ?  —  I,  too,  have  learned 
to  forget.  There  are  some  who  carry 
piteous  records  of  their  dreary  pilgrimage 
to  their  dying  day,  —  some  whom  even  pres 
ent  prosperity  will  never  cheat  into  utter 
oblivion  of  a  bitter  past ;  but  with  most,  the 
dark  days  are  forgotten  in  the  warmth  of 
household  fires.  They  have  only  a  scar 
or  two  to  remind  them  of  the  wounds  that 
had  once  caused  them  such  cruel  throbs  of 
agony.  Time  is  a  great  healer,  a  wonder 
ful  adjuster  of  relations  and  events.  How 
quickly  he  fills  up  the  gaps  !  How  short 
a  time  is  required  for  men  and  women  to 
forget ! 

We  gladly  put  all  responsibility  of  change 
and  loss  on  poor  old  Time,  with  his  back 
already  bowed  and  bent,  who  must  yet  bear 
all  that  coming  generations  may  elect  to 
put  upon  him.  In  turn,  we  flatter  and 
abuse  him  ;  trust  to  him  to  heal  all  wounds, 
and  effusively  give  him  the  credit,  when  the 
scars  grow  fainter  and  fainter  until  they  are 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  209 

lost  to  sight ;  or  else  we  belabor  him,  and 
say  it  is  he  who,  with  relentless  and  un 
seemly  haste,  demands  that  new  faces  shall 
replace  the  old ;  fresh  loves  fill  the  void 
left  by  those  that  are  ended.  Poor,  patient 
old  Time  !  but,  abused  as  he  is,  how  many 
wonderful  lessons  he  can  teach !  how 
many  rough  corners  grow  smooth  under 
his  care  !  what  jagged  edges  are  polished 
down  ! 

How  quickly  time  passes  in  summer ! 
With  no  hurry,  but  with  graceful  celerity, 
the  lovely  days  glide  past  in  their  rich 
robes  of  dark  green  and  sky  blue.  The 
genii  of  summer  play  about  us,  fling  roses 
at  our  feet,  and  strew  the  grass  with  dia 
monds.  They  offer  us  happiness,  show  it 
to  us,  whisper  insinuatingly,  "  Take  it ;  ah, 
take  it !  "  And  some  would  gladly  obey, 
but  their  hands  seem  bound;  and  others 
of  us  remember  how  we  once  on  just  such 
enchanting  summer  days  stretched  out  our 
hands  in  eager  longing  for  the  roses,  and 
at  our  touch  the  roses  vanished,  leaving  only 
the  thorns  in  our  grasp ;  and  we  turn  away 

14 


210         IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

with  mistrustful  sighs.  Others  examine  the 
offered  joy  hesitatingly,  critically ;  refuse  to 
decide,  linger,  and  wait;  and  before  they 
are  aware,  the  beneficent  genii  have  van 
ished,  —  autumnal  blasts  have  driven  them 
away  with  the  roses  and  the  foliage.  The 
sun  shines  no  longer,  the  skies  are  gray ; 
and  as  the  cold  wind  sings  a  shrill  song  of 
scorn  in  my  ears,  I  realize  that  the  love 
that  had  so  filled  my  life,  coloring  every 
thought  and  deed,  has  become  only  one  of 
those  memories  that  steal  over  me  when 
the  twilight  deepens,  and  the  first  purple 
stars  come  shyly  into  the  heavens.  Then 
I  like  to  be  alone ;  that  no  word  may  dis 
turb  the  faint  after-glow  of  a  deep,  warm  joy, 
which  is  now  tinged  with  no  passion  of 
regret,  but  is  only  the  dim,  peaceful  light 
that  follows  the  lurid  fire  of  red  gold  in  the 
evening  sky  after  the  sun  has  sunk  from 
sight. 

The  sadness  of  love  is  love  grown  cold ; 
and  the  bitterest  sorrow  in  life  seems 
sweet  compared  to  the  knowledge  that  the 
grand  passion  that  lent  glory  and  glow  and 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  211 

splendor  to  life  is  surely  fading,  leaving 
only  the  dull,  gray  groundwork  of  the 
commonplace. 

Of  course  no  one  is  the  same  afterwards, 
—  no  one  is  the  same  after  any  sorrow.  It 
would  be  a  poor  result  of  all  our  anguish 
and  all  our  wrestling,  if  we  were  nothing 
but  our  old  selves  at  the  end  of  it,  —  the 
same  self-confidence,  the  same  light  thoughts 
of  human  suffering,  the  same  frivolous  gos 
sip  over  blighted  human  lives,  the  same 
feeble  sense  of  the  Unknown,  toward  which 
we  have  sent  irrepressible  cries  in  our 
loneliness. 

Sorrow  lives  in  us  as  an  indestructible 
force,  only  changing  its  form,  as  forces  do ; 
passing  from  pain  to  sympathy,  —  the  one 
poor  word  which  includes  all  our  purest 
insight  and  best  love. 

But  I  am  sad  to-day,  love,  because  I  can 
not  even  sorrow  that  I  have  lost  you. 

I  am  half  incredulous  to  think  that  I 
am  glad  to  be  alive,  and  you  not  with 
me. 

It  seems  a  shameful  desecration  of  lost 


212          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

dreams;  but  heart  and  brain  have  grown 
quiescent,  and  though  it  hurts  me  to  think 
it,  I  am  content.  It  seems  to  me  now  that 
I  would  not  care  for  that  first  love  to  have 
dragged  itself  through  all  the  thorny  years, 
until  it  was  torn  to  rags.  A  flash  out  of  a 
cloud,  a  sudden  sweetness  that  lasts  but  a 
day,  but  lives  in  the  memory  a  lifetime,  — 
that  was  perfect,  that  was  my  dream,  that 
was  divine.  Books  say,  every  one  of  ex 
perience  tells  us,  that  first  loves  are  as  apt 
to  float  away  from  us  as  thistledown  upon  a 
summer's  breeze. 

A  man's  fancy,  a  maiden's  love  dream,  — 
of  what  value  are  they  in  history  ? 

The  question  next  arises,  what  shall  be 
done  with  our  lost  dreams,  our  first  loves  ? 

"  Whom  first  we  love,  you  know  we 
seldom  wed;  "  and  where  shall  we  store 
these  memories  of  "the  first  girl  I  ever 
loved,"  "the  man  whom  I  once  thought 
perfect "  ?  Is  it  safe  for  a  man  now  a 
husband  to  go  to  the  end  of  time  with 
tender  thoughts  of  her  who  first  waked 
sentiment  within  him?  Should  he  some- 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  213 

times  in  the  evening,  before  the  lamps  are 
lighted,  when  the  tasks  for  the  day  are 
done,  when  resting-time  steals  over  him  at 
sundown,  —  should  he  recall  the  memories 
and  the  longings  and  the  ecstasies  of  that 
earlier  time?  When  he  hears  again  the 
name  of  that  woman,  now  severed  from 
him  by  years  of  life  and  mountains  of  cir 
cumstances,  dare  he  allow  the  blood  to 
quicken  in  his  veins,  the  eye  to  brighten, 
the  voice  to  tremble  and  soften? 

The  woman  who  is  now  a  mother,  who 
has  long  been  a  true  wife  of  the  husband 
of  her  choice,  shall  she  not  think,  now  and 
then,  of  the  man  who  surely  loved  her  in 
the  days  of  yore ;  and  when  she  notes  the 
progress  he  has  made  and  the  friends  he 
has  won,  and  the  deeds  he  has  done,  shall 
she  not  go  back  to  the  past,  and  live  over 
again  the  moments  when  she  was  the  guid 
ing  star,  the  inspiration  of  his  life?  Shall 
she  not  keep  a  chamber  somewhere  in  the 
castle  of  her  thoughts,  where  one  man 
rests  and  is  never  disturbed,  where  he 
never  grows  old  and  never  changes,  but  is 


214          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITATION. 

the  same  tender,  considerate  lover  he  was 
in  the  days  of  youth  ?  She  may  not  keep 
his  letters  (society  seems  to  have  settled 
that),  and  she  may  not  retain  any  of  the 
treasures  that  once  bound  them  together. 
But  may  she  not  think  of  him,  may  she 
not  look  back  with  innocent  delight  at 
the  strong  pressure  of  his  hand  that  day, 
at  the  tender  touch  of  his  lips  that  night  ? 

Surely  the  heart  that  is  pure  may  keep 
forever  the  tokens  of  that  brighter  time, 
when  youth  gilded  all  things,  and  the  seeds 
of  hope  were  planted  that  have  ripened 
into  the  full  harvest  of  life.  They  are 
really  the  best  moments  in  this  grim  old 
world,  and  should  be  no  more  discouraged 
or  frowned  down  than  the  love  of  that 
music  of  childhood  which  has  been  silenced 
so  long,  and  whose  echoes  are  never  waked 
save  on  the  golden  harp-strings  touched  by 
silence  and  sunset. 

And  this  is  what  we  shall  do  with  our  first 
loves.  Cherish  them  till  the  twilight  of 
earth  brightens  towards  the  full  radiance 
of  eternal  day.  Cherish  them  in  the 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  215 

beauty  of  truth,  and  prove  to  that  ideal, 
now  fading  away  in  the  vistas  of  the  past, 
that  you  were  worthy  of  what  you  then 
believed  him,  by  keeping  him  ever  so ;  not 
wishing  to  draw  him  near,  for  the  con 
tamination  of  evil,  nor  sending  him  farther 
away  into  the  chilling  avenues  of  change. 

The  recollection  of  a  deep  and  true 
affection  is  rather  a  divine  nourishment  for 
a  life  to  grow  strong  upon  than  a  passion 
to  destroy  it. 

Life  is  better  for  a  past  like  this.  Earth 
is  purer,  and  heaven  is  nearer ;  and  duties 
can  be  resumed  after  these  reflections  with 
stronger  heart  and  clearer  purpose  than  if 
all  the  glory  and  loveliness  that  crowned 
those  other  days  were  swept  away  by  the 
ruthless  hand  of  an  inward  fear. 

The  world,  with  its  whirl  and  roar,  is 
deafening  the  sweet,  distant  notes  that  come 
up  through  the  old  channels  of  the  affec 
tions.  And  the  months  and  years  slip  by. 
We  have  mourned  enough  to  smile  at  the 
violent  mourning  of  others,  and  have  en 
joyed  enough  to  sigh  over  their  little 
eddies  of  delight. 


2 1 6          IN  MAIDEN  MEDITA  TION. 

Dark  shades  and  delicious  streaks  of 
crimson  and  gold  color  lie  upon  our  lives ; 
and  hearts  with  all  their  weight  of  ashes 
can  yet  quicken  at  the  sound  of  a  step, 
and  faces  will  brighten  with  joyous  smiles 
and  sweet  hopes. 

But,  amid  all,  there  will  float  over  us, 
from  time  to  time,  memories  in  which  we 
will  hear  again  with  thirsty  ear  the  witch 
ing  melody  of  the  days  that  are  no  more. 

"  And  neither  heat  nor  frost  nor  thunder 
Can  wholly  do  away,  I  ween, 
The  marks  of  that  which  once  hath  been." 

And  to-day  I  have  cherished  my  dead 
love. 

Far  down  in  my  nature,  the  strings  of 
a  forgotten  poetry  have  vibrated  softly, 
as  though  they  would  make  music  if  they 
dared. 

Far  back  in  the  chain  of  memories,  the 
memory  once  best  loved  has  almost  waked 
once  more,  the  link  of  once  clasped  hands 
has  almost  lived  again,  the  tender  pressure 
of  fingers  now  dead  to  me  are  again  almost 


AFTER  ONE  SUMMER.  217 

a  reality,  able  to  thrill  body  and  soul,  al 
though  the  certainty  confronts  me  that  these 
things  are  gone  forever. 

The  wind  whistling  dismally  at  the  win 
dow  panes,  the  soft,  steady  downpour  of 
the  rain,  the  whispering  of  the  trees,  low 
hung  against  a  despondent  sky,  have  pro 
duced  sounds  melodious  or  powerful,  sono 
rous  or  melancholy,  and  seemed  in  a  few 
moments  to  have  run  through  the  whole 
range  of  earth's  joy  and  sorrow,  its  strength 
and  its  melancholy.  They  have  stirred  the 
depths  of  my  soul,  then  died  away,  like 
the  voices  of  celestial  spirits  that  pass 
and  disappear. 


THE    END. 


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